commentary – Sassy Dreams Awake

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Wilted Beauty

Posted on September 26, 2023September 26, 2023 by sassysheisme

Houston traffic is rarely kind. You just want to get home and get out of the car and away from all of the tons of metal that try to kill you on the way. Most of us are on autopilot, our thoughts already home and wondering what’s for dinner.

About a half mile from home, I saw her. She wasn’t young, but her circumstances could have made her look older than she is. Her head and shoulders were covered with a terracotta colored scarf, and she carried a bunch of wilted flowers in one hand and a sign that said she was a single mum of three kids needing help with food and rent.

As I’ve written before, I have had to choose between gas, groceries and electricity before. I know how hard it is to make ends meet in a system that sets up women to have to depend on others and fight harder than most to achieve financial security.

I see a lot of people on the streets with signs. This woman, however, was different. I looked at the sun-wrinkled face behind the smile she wore. I saw the divine in her. Her personhood. I saw her.

It was still over 90 degrees and I could tell she’d been out there a while in the heat, trying to get enough money to make it through one more day.

I rarely carry cash, but recently, I was paid back for something in cash and I had that in my wallet. I reached out to give her the money, and she gave me two flowers and tears ran down her face. I saw her, and she’d been seen.

commentary, community

Hometown Blues

Posted on September 10, 2023September 10, 2023 by sassysheisme

When I was growing up, I saw so much potential for my hometown of Huntington, Indiana. Politicians and businessmen were eager to bring jobs and growth to town. Industry and stores bring workers. Workers buy homes. Workers like to go out to eat and play in town, and have good schools for kids. Seems like a simple, but daunting plan. I love to see Huntington fight for its future.

I have lived elsewhere for thirty years. Each time I come back to Huntington, something else has closed down or moved away (likely to Wabash, where they actually seem to support a growth plan). The south side of town has especially been hard hit. I don’t even recognize it anymore.

When my friend and brother, Ian Stallings, told me he was renovating and reopening the Silver Moon Pub on the south side of town, I was ecstatic. I visited him last summer and he showed me the progress he’d made on construction and his vision for what this pub would be. Beyond job creation and a place for friends and family to meet, drink and be merry, this building would also include apartments and artist space for his WIAR project (Wabash International Artist Residency) that has brought artists and culture to locations up and down the Wabash River Valley.

My brother Ian loves Huntington. He loves it so much, he poured his blood, sweat, tears and money into having a quality gathering space into a town that desperately needs it. Yet, as has proven out for decades now, Huntington doesn’t recognize or support businesses or business people that bring something to their town that isn’t on their terms. There is a long history of businesses that give up that fight and go elsewhere (did I mention Wabash seems to have gotten with the program?).

I was looking forward to hanging out with Ian (and “Other Ian” who was managing the space) when I was home last week. We made those plans last year, long before the opening. Once the space opened, it started to grow and thrive. Most projects and initiatives that Ian touches, do just that. I couldn’t wait to visit the Silver Moon Pub.

I had hoped that Huntington had progressed enough to support this vision and business. I guarantee you, once the pub succeeded, Ian was just getting started. Unfortunately, Huntington’s vision doesn’t see past the courthouse or into the wider world. I saw that those who claim to care about Huntington managed to drive out another business owner with excuses and deliberate roadblocks (that’s figurative, but I also heard there were physical ones, too).

If you have someone that wants to invest in your community, you make the phone calls that need to be made to keep a space open, not throw up your hands in fake concern and turn your back on someone that loves your town and wants to see it grow. BS is BS, Huntington, and we can all smell it. Shame on you. SHAME ON YOU.

The only vision Huntington has for the Silver Moon Pub is what they or someone who is like minded would do with that space and those dollar signs will not produce what they hope for and the space will not thrive like it would under Ian’s ownership. I’m not sure what the reasoning behind not helping this pub stay open, but if it’s why I think it is, they need to grow up if Huntington is to grow. Huntington, you need people like Ian Stallings to invest in your community. Do better.

I visited the Silver Moon Pub while I was in Huntington last week and saw the FOR SALE sign Ian has in the window. I know he is hurt and discouraged, but my sincere hope is that Ian reconsiders and reopens. Nobody else in Huntington will love, grow, and encourage that space like Ian has and would do so through it’s future.

Activism, badassery, commentary, fearless, flowers

I am NOT less than.

Posted on October 9, 2022 by sassysheisme

In 2022, women are still “less than.”

We still don’t get equal pay for equal work.

We no longer have bodily autonomy.

We are dangerously close to no longer having religious freedom – one has decided it’s their way or else (they’re a minority) and they are trying legislate it down everyone’s throats.

We are marginalized, suppressed and fed the lie that we are not whole as single entities.

We are not put on this earth to supply a “domestic supply of infants” as long as there are THOUSANDS of foster children in Texas alone.

What’s it going to take, women? What’s it going to take men/women/other that love women? Vote like your life, livelihood and future depends on it, because it does.

Rant over. Will close the comments in a heartbeat if someone decides to challenge me on my own Facebook page. I am tired of all of it. ALL OF IT.

Rant over…for the second time.

advocate, commentary, Pandemic Social Distancing

Vaccination

Posted on April 11, 2021 by sassysheisme

Last Thursday, I received the second dose of my Moderna COVID vaccine. I was so relieved, I cried. Honestly, OVERWHELMINGLY relieved. It’s one step closer to being closer to whatever normal was 16 months ago.

When I hear people say they don’t want/need the vaccine, my heart breaks. These are the same people who want “normal” back, they want everything open and to move on with their lives, but they don’t want the vaccine.

I know people have their reasons. Fear. Side effects. They live where they don’t think they’ll need it. Blind obedience to someone who says they don’t need it. Religion. Whatever. Reasons.

This pandemic has already dragged out longer than it’s needed to. A year ago, we had the opportunity to nip this virus, but instead, America chose it’s “freedoms.”

On my left shoulder, you can still see my smallpox vaccine scar. Not long after I received mine, they stopped giving them to children. Why? With the vaccine, they had eradicated smallpox in this country and most places in the world. When the polio vaccine was offered in the 1950’s, people lined up to get the vaccine. Why? Because it was effective and protective against polio. Less than ten years later, polio was all but gone, and by the 1970’s, polio was no longer a threat.

Why is COVID different? Why has the attitude toward public health changed? Why don’t those choosing not to get the vaccination care about themselves or others? It’s baffling. Truly baffling. I remember being required to prove I’d been vaccinated against a myriad of diseases not nearly as viral or as deadly as COVID to go to school/college. A COVID vaccine is just one more for the list.

We’re headed toward the exit of this pandemic, but we are not there yet. To protect myself and those I love, I cannot, in good conscience, visit or reconnect with people who aren’t vaccinated yet. Those who refuse the vaccination, I may not get to see you for a while. I hope you understand. I have to look out for my own health, and if you won’t, I have to draw the line.

The CDC says I can travel domestically. I can have small gatherings with other vaccinated peeps. Science says not to put the masks away just yet. Keep doing what kept me healthy so far.

I’ve lived part of my life following, and somewhere I crossed over to living on the edge and leading the way. Trying new things and boldly going places I’ve never been. To me, choosing to be vaccinated is one of my boldest choices. I follow the science.

I hope more people choose the vaccine down the line, once they’ve seen its effectiveness. I want to put this pandemic in my rearview mirror, and the only way to do that is to fight it with methods we know that work – distancing, vaccines, masks.

Vaccines work. I have the smallpox vaccine scar to prove it.

Activism, commentary, Equality

Selma

Posted on January 18, 2021 by sassysheisme

I had not watched Selma until today. My love for Ava DuVernay not withstanding, I knew watching it would tear me apart. Three minutes in, I was sobbing. The murders of Addie May, Carole, Cynthia, and Denise by the KKK made me scream, “Why?!” I know this was one of over 40 bombings by the KKK. Violence is never the answer.

I know Dr. Martin Luther King wasn’t perfect, but he answered the call. He acted. Peacefully. He incited peaceful protests. He led marches. He lived the words he spoke.

It’s been nearly two weeks since non-peaceful insurrectionists, white supremacists, invaded our Capitol while Congress was in session with the intent to harm. They gleefully recorded their exploits and posted them in various places, including Parler, a cesspool of white supremacists, neo nazis and a few people wandering in because they believe they are being censored (they aren’t) elsewhere.

They are having the nerve to act surprised that they are being arrested for breaking into the Capitol building (a felony), stealing Capitol property, and vandalizing what they proudly proclaimed as “our House.”

Some were armed. Some beat a policeman with a Blue Lives Matter flagpole. A policeman, trying to keep these insurrectionists from killing Congressmembers, died. Their grievance? Believing the lies peddled by the soon to be former administration. Their grievance? Butt hurt that whites are losing their grip on the power they’ve kept through voter suppression and maximizing their minority through that suppression and other means.

Why is equality so scary to some? Fear is driving these people to attack the very foundations of our democracy and spew hatred while praying to God. It’s been 55 years since the beginning of the Civil Rights movement and we’re still so far behind where we need to be as a nation.

If you are one of the white supremacists that marched into the Capitol building, you aren’t being persecuted, you are being held accountable. You stood up for someone who couldn’t care a rat’s ass about you, and you will pay the price for your actions and he will not rescue you.

I, myself, dream of a vibrant, “minority-majority” society. One where we can live together in harmony, celebrating each others’ differences, and celebrating our shared humanity. I believe it’s still possible, but only if we acknowledge that there’s still a problem, and only if we cut out the heart of the white supremacist movement and stand up for all people.

CANCER, commentary, Grief, holidays, Pandemic Social Distancing, Uncategorized

In Like a Lamb, Out Like a Lion

Posted on December 31, 2020 by sassysheisme

I can’t believe we are at the end of 2020. I started off the year by choosing “Roar” as my One Word 365 choice. Little did I know I would not be the one roaring my way through the year, but COVID 19 would instead.

Today is social distancing day 291. Trying to bring my thoughts together is difficult, simply because the circumstances of my life haven’t really changed from day to day. I had so many plans for my staycation, but mostly all I’ve done is survive. That, my friends, is a worthy goal achieved. Don’t let anyone tell you differently.

Last night, I took a late call from a friend who lost her mother to a savage, quick-spreading cancer. We talked about all COVID had taken from us, robbed from us in broad daylight. Though she was able to have the final, precious moments with her mother, her confidante, her best friend, she was robbed of all the moments she could have had if she had been able to visit her in the hospital the last few weeks. My aunt could have had her family visit her and not leave her wondering if everyone was dead because they weren’t coming to see her. My aunt didn’t understand. My friend doesn’t understand. I don’t understand.

None of us understand.

COVID has robbed me of visits, precious time with my family. Some aren’t getting any younger, and some are getting older at a pace that if you blink, so much is missed. Kids are missing the camaraderie of choir, sports, clubs, and special dances. The adults are missing some semblance of preciously needed down time. Others are missing company. We are all missing something.

Yet there are still people out there who complain about masks or doing anything to prevent COVID for their neighbor. Even if it was only symbolic and not effective, as they claim, they still show their selfishness putting their supposed inconvenience against showing they care for their neighbors, their families, OUR families.

One of my childhood “Dads” passed from COVID recently. Two more adults from my childhood have died as well in the same time period, and while they may not have passed from COVID, COVID is robbing the families of proper funerals, robbing them from the normal first steps of the grief journey.

Compassion is free. Kindness costs nothing. Empathy means you are emotionally mature enough to realize it’s NOT ABOUT YOU because you’ve felt someone else’s pain and you can understand what someone’s going through. Our country is full of people who cannot muster any of those three emotional states or actions. That’s one of many frightening revelations COVID has shown me about America in 2020.

I am hopeful, that as vaccines are distributed (disturbingly slow) that COVID, the great thief, becomes COVID the great professor of how to human better. Many lessons yet to learn, many battles yet to fight, but we made it to this point in time. A time to look back (20/20) and a time to look forward.

I haven’t chosen a “One Word” for 2021. I don’t know if I will or not. After all, I chose the voice of a lion for a year that began hopeful and bright that turned into a roaring storm that has tossed me about while staying rooted in the same place for way too long. I need to think more carefully and reflect on lessons learned in 2020 that began like a lamb, and is ending as a rain-soaked roaring lion.

Activism, challenge, commentary, community

Blackkklansman

Posted on April 27, 2019 by sassysheisme

I’ve watched Blackkklansman several times now. Parts of it make me sick, particularly the parts where “Christians” believe white is right and the only color. Harry Belafonte’s part where he recounts several atrocities is particularly strong. One hopes we’ve made progress. Right?

Then a church going white man drives into a crowd to kill people for their assumed religion based on how they look. In Sunnyvale, California. In 2019.

We can do better, America. We need to stand up for each other. Own the past. Change the future.

I still have hope change can happen. May I do my part.

Activism, commentary, community, holidays, Human Rights, Humanity, politics

MLK Day

Posted on January 15, 2018 by sassysheisme

Until 1988, I didn’t know much about Martin Luther King, Jr. Nothing was taught about him in history class (of course, no history class I was in got much further than WW2), and so it passed under my radar.

In college, I had a friend named Dee Dee who suggested, since we were near Atlanta on Spring Break, that we go see the MLK Center opened by Dr. King’s widow.

We went on our journey that day and I didn’t know what to expect from our visit, but I left the MLK Center very reflective and sad that someone who fought so hard for equality was persecuted for it. He was not perfect, but he was important. For all of us.

My life is richer because of the diversity in it. May we all work together so we are all on equal footing to reach our dreams.

Happy birthday to the King of all Dreamers.

Activism, advocate, commentary, community, Equality, fearless, feminism, Uncategorized, World

NEVERTHELESS, I PERSIST

Posted on August 13, 2017 by sassysheisme

Yesterday was another day of political upheaval here in the United States. I am 48 years young but I’ve never seen (or was too young to really remember) anything like the baffling regression of the American spirit like I’ve witnessed over the past 18 months or so.

I will say this and leave it right here: I believe in equality for everyone. Everyone. Progress has been made the past decade to close many gaps for many different people groups and I refuse to let any group in this country try to drag us back to the dark ages of closed-minded thinking.

With that out in the ether I’ll add this: I’m ashamed of the president and what he’s stirred up in this country and continues to allow with no intelligent comment or rebuke. I have a great admiration for presidents past, and I hope to have a president I can admire and be proud of and respect again, but 45 is not that president. I have great respect for the office of the president, but I do not respect the current president. I can and will make that distinction for the duration of his term. If you voted for him, that is your right, but please don’t try to defend him or your choice. I am tired of that conversation. It’s done.

My heart hurts for the family that lost a sweet daughter yesterday. All she was doing was protesting a hate group. Peacefully. She believed in the diversity and love of all in America and she was marching to show this hate group that she still believed we could all get along, that there was room enough at her table for all. This hate group cannot stand that thought, and one man from that group took it upon himself to violently end her life and injure many others because people like her are trying to put other beliefs, thoughts and color into his whitewashed world.

I believe I am fortunate to be surrounded by a wondrously varied group of people every day. I work for an international company in the most diverse city in America. I work with people who were not born in this country who came here for freedom and chose the US and became citizens. Some are just here for a few years or months, others’ parents or grandparents came here and brought their rich cultures to the greatest melting pot in the world.

I navigate a number of cultures, religions, belief systems, biases and dissimilarities every single day. Harmony, even when there are notable differences, can be achieved if everyone allows their worldview to be wide enough to consider that not everyone was raised the same, believes the same, or wants the same outcomes for their lives.

I still don’t understand the notion of making America great again (MAGA), as if America wasn’t already great. It seems to me that the MAGA directive for the 45 supporter is to regress back to the idea that one way is the only way, which is anchored in ignorance and fear.

I wholeheartedly believe that America’s diversity is its strength. When hate groups march (which is their right as long as they are peaceful) and preach that they want to keep America the way it is or was (for them) they miss the point. America has always been diverse. America has always been a haven for all. These groups have just isolated themselves so much that they are afraid of what and whom they don’t know or understand. Rather than build a bridge, they want to vote everyone else off their very small-minded island.

I’ve lived in Houston 23 years now. I went from a small town in Indiana where most people looked, talked and thought like me to the most diverse and culture rich city in America. I am all the better for it. I understand so much more of the world because the world is here all around me and it is a wondrous assortment of people. If MAGA means isolation, hatred, racism, and a white’s only attitude, I want no part of it.

After the events yesterday in Charlottesville, I was a bit disheartened to say the least. America feels like it is sliding backward, and I feel like a small minority of hatred is going to suck me down with it. I can’t let that happen, but I don’t always know what I can do.

I become overwhelmed with the vastness of the pervasive hatred that some humans have against other humans simply because they are not disciples of the same ethos or they have a different color of skin. What can one person do to turn the tide?

I was reminded today to do something I already try to do – reach one person at a time. Learn as much as I can about our differences and use every opportunity to lift that person up. If that person needs an ally, I will stand with them. I will celebrate everything that makes them unique, because I also thrive when my uniqueness is noted and celebrated.

It really does boil down to treating others as you yourself want to be treated.

Nevertheless, I persist.

commentary, Ocean, travel, travels, Uncategorized, value

BEACHES

Posted on May 16, 2016 by sassysheisme

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Work has taken me to Florida again. This time, I planned a trip to the beach as it will likely rain the rest of the week. I wanted to get some sand between my toes before I dive into work tomorrow.

After dinner, I sat on the beach for a glorious hour, listening to waves crash and watching a dad bury his two girls in the sand. I received a text that my parking meter was running low, so I reluctantly headed back to the MINIVAN the rental place gave me.

An old man (and by old, I mean way older than my father), was sitting in a row of chairs in the plaza by himself. He made eye contact so I went over and introduced myself. Carl is no longer able to get down to the ocean. Bad knees, bad hips, bad everything, so he comes down and sits as close to the ocean as he can.

He asked how it was down on the beach and if I put my toes in the water and the sand and what it felt like, so I told him. This particular beach had damp, coarse sand that actually flaked off easier than powdered sand. He thought that was a great description.

We talked some more, then he said, “go while you can. You never know when you won’t be able to feel the sand between your toes anymore.”

He was still smiling, but my heart broke a little bit. Clearly, he loved the ocean. Those chairs were as close as he was going to get to it at this point in his life as far as he was concerned.

I’m not old by any means, but I know I am at the end of the summer of my life. I can’t imagine a time when I won’t be able to do simple things that give me pleasure, but I know it’s inevitable.

“Enjoy everything while you can,” he reiterated. “Was it a good trip to the beach?”

Yes, Carl, it was. Thank you for the reminder that I need to squeeze everything I can out of every moment I can.