Shuffle Time!



(Gratutious shot of a train in the snow, taken from our back porch in December.)

I'm going to try to better organize my blogs. I know, about time, right? But it's easier said than done.

Tryl's Meanderings is going to stay pretty much the same. You'll get random thoughts that I get the energy to write about, updates on family things (because I actually have family who reads this), craft and food tutorials or recipes, and random collections of links I find intersting. And I'm going to try to publish something every week - which means I might manage to have it happen every other week. I'm certainly going to try. So, that's the easy part.

Oak and Olive is going to become home of my writing alter-ego. I think. This will make it pagan/earth-centered information as well as a writing site. I'm hoping that means I publish more there as to never publishing something on either Oak and Olive or Laurel Reufner's Lair. I'm going to try to have an article on Lupercalia up soon.

And Bridgette's Scrapbook should be seeing some action once again as I start sharing our adventures with you all. My NaNo attempt this past November was to go back to the beginnings of our group and start writing. The site may also become a discussion destination for our group as we think over our characters and settings over the years and try to restore some continuity. I'll label those posts clearly, so if regular readers want to jump over them, they easily can.

As for Ghost Girl's site, I'm not sure. I need to sit down with my daughter and have a chat. I think it could be an intersting visit if she'd only write for it. (Well, that answers that. It doesn't load anymore.)

So, off to get to work. I hope to have a tutorial up by next Tuesday on how I made a cute Valentine's wreath for our front door. It's a Dollar Store craft, which I love to do for my door decor.

And see? This was a whine free post! I'm almost back to normal after being sick at the beginning of the month. I even called my mom to talk last night! My voice is still recovering, but it's so much better now.

Feelings of Loss

Saturday I slipped into my favorite, best fitting pair of jeans. I don't wear them often because they're getting a bit too far onto the threadbare side. They hung on my. The waist was still not a bad fit, but the rest just hung. They are so baggy in the seat now, as well as the front. I couldn't believe it. I didn't think I'd lost that much weight in the last couple of months, but wow!

So, I went in to have a health screening at OU today - part of their Healthy Ohio inititiave. Guess what? Not only was my blood pressure wonderful (113/64 - take THAT Monkey Girl!) but my weight was 198 and change. I've finally slipped below that danged threshold. The question now is, can I keep going? I don't ever expect to be 110 and a size 5 again - my body's changed as I got older AND had two kids - but it feels good to get some of that extra off. Size 18's fit better and don't look as sloppy on me. Heck, I'm almost in a size 16 now.

Being diabetic, with lower back issues, this is a great thing. Psychologically, since the smaller sizes now fit better, it's a great thing. Not everyone was meant to be tiny, but my smaller frame isn't quite so lost and my face has more definitly in it. Losing something never felt so good.

I Was Once Called Gay

Of all the things I thought my next blog post would be about - my job, writing, November - bullying certainly wasn't on the list. I post a lot of what I consider civil rights and common sense and decency issues to Facebook,  but I really do try to limit a lot of the political stuff to issues that are really important to me. This post will touch on two of those issues: bullying and gay rights.

(For the record, I've friended several folks whom I went to school with on Facebook and consider several of them to be geniune friends should we meet on the street. This isn't intended to make them upset, but I need to tell the story as it happened.)

You see, I was that kid that everyone picked on in school. In elementary school it was mainly by exclusion - I simply didn't fit into any of the various groups. And yes, I was teased, although I doubt any of my tormentors meant it to be mean. Middle school was an entirely different matter, though. There were a couple of 8th grade girls who took delight, for whatever reason, in deliberately tormenting me. Maybe I wore an invisible "Kick Me" sigh that only school bullies could see. By the middle of the year, the one girl had taken to calling me "gay" whenever she saw me in the hall. She obviously enjoyed my embarassment and discomfort. I was a very shy, quiet, and awkward kid, preferring to blend nicely into the background thank you very much.

The torture lasted for the better part of the year, until she nearly split my lip on a water fountain (accidentally) trying to show off for her friend. Maybe she decided I was cool for not making a big production out of it because that was pretty much the end of her torment. (Goodness knows I could have made a big deal of it if I'd wanted to. Braces meeting water fountain isn't fun. AND I was in good with the admin folks, but I knew it really was a stupid accident.)

I really must have worn an invisible sign of some sort, because when I started at a new high school in 9th grade, on the other side of the county, there was a girl in my new class who reminded me so much of that other girl, although she didn't call me gay. She did, however, try her best to pick a fight with me - for months. I simply wouldn't take the bait and didn't appear bothered by her one bit. I'm sure it confused her. I had no problem with being called chicken, because I wasn't. It's just that a fight would have been stupid. (One day I walked up to her in the cafeteria after lunch and further confused her by asking what I had done to offend her. She looked at me like I was an alien. *grin* I told her that if she could tell me what I'd done, I'd happily apologize. The torment stopped that afternoon. She simply didn't know what to do with me after that.)

I survived the teasing and have obviously gotten on with my life. Sometimes it wasn't easy. I had to do a lot of work on self-esteem and confidence issues and sometimes I still need to work on them, but I got there and I'm rather happy with my life now. However, I've never forgotten what it feels like to be called names. The girl in question wanted to hurt me, for whatever reason. I can understand the need of marginalized and tormented students to either escape somehow or to reach out and hurt those who are hurting them.

Obviously, I'm not gay. I'm happy married to a guy I love and I've two wonderful daughters. If I had been gay, even if I hadn't realized it at the time, this story might have a different ending. I was already suicidal in high school. Maybe such teasing and name calling would have pushed me right over that very narrow edge. Maybe not.

I do feel for those who bully. In most cases something is obviously lacking in their life. However, I feel sorrier for those who are bullied. Too often their innocent victims, in the wrong place at the wrong time and attracting the wrong attention. There should be zero tolerance for bullying. There should be zero tolerance for tormenting a kid because of who he or she might be attracted to. Goodness knows that they're probably having a difficult enough time dealing with things as it is. And there should definitly be zero tolerance for seeing just how vicious you can get and how far you can push someone just so you feel big, and powerful, and important. You're noticed all right....for the wrong reasons.