I am concerned with the molecular challenges to equanimity. I would define equanimity as everyone being free. I would define freedom as living without pain, and in a state of creative contentment. Is this as elusive to other people as I think it is?
I consider myself an art historian and genealogist, and someone who fights for the little guy. Sometimes this can be bad when I point out to people they are not the little guy. I can see these things because someone took the time to point them out to me, and I am thankful for that, because they are ways I had enslaved myself.
*****
Christmas cards are an important tool for capitalism through engendering envy and greed. I think there are ways to share holiday cards that don't do this. I know an English teacher, for example, whose humility and humor is employed in a legendary way through holiday greetings. I appreciate that kind of intelligence.
Public displays of wealth at this time are a serious indicator of a person’s lack of concern with respect to how COVID affects people unequally, and also with what it means to be a responsible citizen. They also are demonstrative of a lack of basic understanding of the very real effects of climate change. I understand that before this crisis hit us, many of us were like Bunny Foo Foo, hopping along thinking that our consumerism and vices played little part in the struggles of others, but supply chains are fueled by the labor of people who make a lot less than many of us do.
People who live in areas that have been affected by wildfire and also have air quality problems who refuse to curtail unnecessary fuel consumption due to boredom, and not just because they need to pay the bills, probably actually need mental health services.
The government is misrepresenting the effectiveness of rapid tests. First of all, it is possible to have a false negative. Second of all, as another person pointed out, five days after a positive test is not adequate sequestration. I just talked to a guy whose only symptom was a cough and mental confusion. He had a positive test, but went back to work, which I find confusing. As I said in other writing, I would like to believe that this is just an innocent error in judgment on the part of our elected officials, and that they simply don’t understand the science behind these things, but as the situation continues to worsen, I wonder if they may have other agendas. I will not elaborate at this time, but if nothing is done to curtail unnecessary exposure and spread of potential psychiatric sequelae in the population, I will elaborate. I feel like this is an assault on consciousness.
It is likely that homes which have higher levels of VOCs are more likely to burn in a wildfire. When I read reports of wildfires, I always hear stories of homes that miraculously were spared. Sometimes it is because someone had time to wet the property, but not always. A campaign to study this would not be a bad idea. It would also not be a bad idea to study the relationship between the VOC levels in a home, proximity to large streets, and per capita spending. For that matter, it would also be a good idea to study the relationship between VOCs and vaccine reactions. I believe there may also be a relationship between VOC exposure and mental health. Additionally, I think a relationship between VOC exposure and COVID sequelae is likely.
If you are unfortunate enough to have a serious vaccine reaction like I did, you’re hard pressed to get anyone to believe you or help you. Furthermore, you end up being bullied by the glitchy people on both sides of the issue. And if seriously disabled by COVID or the vaccine, the harsh reality is that a lot of people are going to find out that our disability system is not set up to be a support for capitalism for anyone receiving it, despite the nasty stereotypes. You can’t get disability if anyone else in your household makes money, so in a world where it takes at least two people to afford even the least expensive housing, it means one person is stuck doing all the work for money, and that person really needs to at least make a middle class wage. I am fairly certain I am disabled, but I do not know how I am going to get a diagnosis. My situation is so weird. I feel like it is Functional Neurological Disorder. I know how to treat it, but it prevents me from driving. I need to wear a respirator when I am out on the road.
I am going to have to renew my driver's license, and I feel like it is unsafe to require people to remove their masks indoors to get a new picture. I think the government should allow people to use a previous picture for their driver's license, or provide an extension until COVID is better managed.
It is a fallacy that this problem has been caused solely by the elite. As consumers, we create the demand, and they respond to it. We have just become so easy to control that they can hypnotize us into wanting things, even when we do not need them. We wanted easy solutions to the pandemic, so they gave us vaccines, and now that they are not working, they are trying to figure out how to unload their waste without getting stuck with the cost. They are also trying not to bring attention to the fact the vaccines are no longer working in people who are already vaccinated, and that our heroes failed us, maybe even making the situation worse than it would have been if we had been honest about how our material neediness was going to be our species’ Achilles Heel.
People who have not suffered infection at this point or for whom infection was mild may not consider the seriousness of participating in spread for selfish gain. Also, in some people infection may manifest just as brain fog or fatigue, and may impair a person’s memory about even being sick. These otherwise asymptomatic people are probably still capable of spreading the virus. The virus can increase anxiety which may make them feel that they desperately need to work on something, when what they really need to do is rest. They may try to seduce or guilt others into connection in some codependent way.
We keep having this happen - we know a homeschooling family that is still not vaccinating, but also won't wear masks, and keeps asking my daughter to meet up. I have explained to the mother how significantly infection has harmed the other people in our family neurologically, and she just can't seem to get it through her head. I told my daughter that none of the rest of us support her getting together with them anymore, and that she needs to communicate to them that she will not be getting together while there is an active increase in infections, and also not until they either choose to wear proper masks and have immunity from a COVID infection or vaccination. I also expressed my concern earlier last year that she needs to be honest with other people she gets together who are vaccinated and wear masks that she sometimes meets with these people. I am really frustrated right now that my daughter doesn't understand biology (and that her friends and our extended family don't, either). I've already been through this. Yes, I had vaccine reactions, and they weren't just a day long, they were weeks long, but it was so much less severe than having COVID before I was vaccinated.
The breakthrough infections I had were a nuisance, and I certainly don't want to have anymore, but those are preferable to having a native infection without any vaccination. So my recommendation to the wary would be to get the Moderna vaccine, and report any reactions you have to VAERS. Be honest about them, and don't exaggerate. I had what felt like Guillain-Barre, which I believe was swelling of my nervous system that seriously aggravated sciatica and other spinal cord injuries I have had, but once the inflammation went down I was mostly okay. Any remedies that you think are going to work on COVID (the mother explained that the government was hiding cures, and that we shouldn't be afraid) should also work on vaccine reactions, and if they don't, well, they probably weren't going to work on COVID, because the vaccine is mostly a hamstrung version of the virus. I did run across the questionable information being peddled by certain "natural health practitioners" and I haven't had a chance to evaluate their treatments yet, but I can say that I don't see any reason why some of these MLM products they peddle would work to support metabolism in such a way as to make up for the ways COVID damages it.
Furthermore, a one day down tick in positive tests does not mean we are at the end, and it's important to stop believing that hype, because positive cases seem to "decline" every weekend. People are more motivated to get tested during the week so they don't spread whatever they have at work, but on the weekend there's no need to have to tell an employer you can't come in. Case numbers usually jump back up by Monday evening.
There is an important difference between taking shots at a person for things they can’t help about themselves (lack of wealth, time, space, weight, neurodiversity issues), and pointing out ways they uphold the status quo and systems of inequity through participation in managerial-class value displays.
It is messed up to give people food one knows makes them sick, when it has been discussed over and over, and especially when people are trying to stay healthy in case they get exposed. Another infraction, and I will elaborate. Poisoning people with one’s values is unkind.
Furthermore, if it is possible to smell the breath of a low-carb dieter or juice faster (ahem) from 15 feet across the room, 6 feet was probably not far enough.
On that note, Michelle Buteau's Buteaupia gave me the laugh I really needed!
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