Letters to the Editor
pacificwhim
Published Letters: 201 Editor's Choice: 37
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You made me smile
[Read the article: My son, the stranger]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Anne, thank you. Tonight I'm exhausted and overwhelmed, both coming and going. Going because my wife was taken off ventilator today after a week in the ICU because of the most severe, life-threatening asthma attack you can have and still live. It's been a week of graduated hell, starting in the ninth level, when for four days she showed no response, to today, when they weaned her and fully woke her. I'm raw and tired and frayed and we have a two-year old daughter who I now know will not lack a mama.
I'm exhausted and overwhelmed coming because of everything else: the fact that my weak and scared wife begged me to take her home from the hospital today while still plugged with tubes and leads, desperate to see her little girl and not knowing yet that she will no longer be able to nurse with the life-saving steroids in her system...the fact that as a writer who works at home, I've got to find a way to care for my wife, my daughter and my home and still get my work done while giving my wife a chance to recover...the financial stresses always associated with healthcare these days...not knowing if my headstrong, stubborn wife, who has always attached her self-esteem to what she can do for others while ignoring her own needs, will comply with her asthma management program...the uncertainty and change of this trying, trying time...my little girl's wailing and tantrums all day and refusal to sleep tonight, which may have more to do with being two years old and possibly getting teeth than mama's absence, but which sear my heart and ruin my patience...being the phone center for our world of hundreds of friends wanting to know, "When? How? What can we do?"...just being sapped and drained and in need of a night watching baseball and not worrying.
In spite of the blessings of our friends and my wife's recovery, I feel overwhelmed and depressed. Of course, I felt the same black wave of despair when we brought our daughter home from the same hospital, and I flashed on the idea as I got a diaper: "What did we do? We'll never have a moment to ourselves again." Of course, that turned out to be nonsense; our girl is the goofy, brilliant light of our lives. Change is always stressful; we want to think the routine of our days will always be what it is. But it cannot be. It always changes.
My point here is that in the face of all this, partially driven by just being beat down pooped and at my limit, I've been despairing and desperate-feeling all day. But then I read your piece and saw the things you did when you found your beloved son turning into a monstrous enemy, which must have rent your heart: coping things, things that reflect a simple understanding: this shall pass. And I feel better. I took my daughter for a drive and she passed out. My wife is frail but alive when she might not have been. Life will be sweeter.
Thank you.
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Sense of what?
[Read the article: Vanilla guy]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Humor, that's what. Dems appear to have one, at least moreso than Republicans. This was hysterical, and it raises a good point: Democrats should fight the GOP with blistering sarcasm and verbal contempt for their failed ideas, not joust on the same field of "I'm more American than thou!". When you want to destroy your enemy, belittle him and make him irrelevant.
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It's about power over women
[Read the article: Abortion under siege in Mississippi]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I've asked the same question about being against abortion and birth control of born-again Christian friends of mine, and they say it's really about one thing: the patriarchal fundamentalist Christian hierarchy being terrified of female sexual power and sexuality in general. So they try to control conception, childbirth, sexual preference, etc. They fear sexuality because it is so primal; they want the only primal passions to involve their vengeful Deity. Very 1984 (the book, not the year).
What I don't get is, um, what do gays and Muslims have to do with this? If you're against abortion, that's fine. Protest if you have to, it's in the First Amendment. But burning rainbow flags and copies of the Koran? Does being a Christian these days come down to being a hate-spewing ignoramus talking nonsense about the Last Days and teaching your kids that what God really wants us to do is exterminate people who don't believe as we do?
Is that fucking insane, or is it just me?
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Spread the word
[Read the article: Blunt vows a freeze on global warming fight]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Another talking point for November. Already, we have the GOP as lying us into a disastrous war, cheerleading as we torture people, stepping on their cranks during Katrina and refusing to raise the minimum wage. Now we can tar them as the friendly folks who like watching old people die in heat waves.
Suddenly, the Dems don't look so bad.
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This might not suck so bad
[Read the article: Apocalypse soon]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Let's think about this imminent apocalypse stuff for a second:
• No need to return my videos to Blockbuster.
• I can cancel next week's dentist appointment.
• I can tell my credit card company to shove their bill up their ass.
• I can eat bacon and fried Twinkies 3 meals a day.
• I can walk around naked, insult the girlfriends of bikers who outweigh me by 150 lbs., and drive my car on the wrong side of the road.
Who cares? The world is ending! Woo hoo!
Then again, maybe not. Because you Christian freaks are inSANE. How sad that millions are afflicted with the desire to commit mass suicide. That's what it is when you hate your pathetic life so much that your greatest hope is that it end.
Sad. Just sad. Now if we can just vomit you out of government so we're left with the garden variety corrupted, entitled slime, we'll be cruising.