My two-cents worth and then some. An online journal by LP Brown.

Browsing Category The Way I See It

GI Jane Joke was no Knee-Slapper

by on ·Entertainment, Opinion, The Way I See It

Wow! Not since I saw the butt-naked streaker run across the stage during the 1974 Oscars have I seen anything so mouth-dropping as when Will Smith slapped the GI Jane joke out of Chris Rock’s mouth. And as if the smack heard around the world wasn’t enough, Smith went back to his seat and shouted obscenities. “Keep my wife’s name out of your f***ing mouth.”

Since everyone else with two lips and a pulse is opining about the Smith-Rock show, I’m adding my two cents.

Rock’s joke may have been in poor taste, but when is using physical violence against someone who says something you dislike okay? Is it all right for a student to strike a school teacher because he or she was asked to stop cutting up? Heck no. Is it okay for a parent to hit (and God forbid spank) their misbehaving child when a time-out is a waste of time? Well, that depends on who you ask.

The same premise can be applied to the infamous slap. Two wrongs don’t make a right. As I see it, the problem with many of today’s rebellious youths is that they have out-of-control parents as role models. Case in point – Smith’s son Jaden reportedly tweeted, “And that’s how we do it.” Would his response have been the same if Smith had pulled out a gun and shot Rock dead?

Smith lost points with me when he displayed a hair-trigger adverse reaction to what was said in jest. And I wonder, did it occur to him – for a split second – to wait to talk to Rock man-to-man off-stage and tell him that he didn’t appreciate his bad joke? Or was the actor hell-bent on displaying another Oscar-worthy performance?

Judging by what I’ve seen and heard, the public is divided on their feelings about the incident. If ordinary people expect celebrities to be role models, then Smith needs to check his demeanor because his inappropriate behavior took him to a new low. On the other hand, Rock showed restraint and class; he also refused to press charges for the assault.

According to ET the Oscars is broadcast in over 200 countries. Being the recipient of the bitch-slap heard around the world is the ultimate humiliation. I don’t even want to think about the outcry that would have resulted if Rock had socked him back and the two wound up grappling on the stage. That surely would have gotten more gasps than the naked man streaking across the stage over forty years ago.

I’ve heard some folks say that they wonder if Smith was under the influence of too much alcohol or some other judgment clouding, courage-boasting substance or if he was having a breakdown. Many folks are also saying that they believe there is something deeper eating at Smith than Rock’s GI Jane joke.

Since we were not privileged to hear the conversation between Denzel, Tyler Perry, and others who appeared to be trying to comfort Smith backstage, we don’t know what they were saying to him. I’d like to think that instead of saying, “Way to go, man!” at least one, if not all, of them, told him that what he did was out of line. It has also been reported that Smith said Denzel told him, “At your highest moment, be careful. That’s when the devil comes for you.'” Take heed Will Smith. Take heed.

This morning on The View, Smith’s mom expressed her surprise about her son’s actions. She said that she had never seen him behave that way.

And while many people are empathizing with “Poor Will” I agree with today’s guest host also on The View. She expressed her thoughts concerning the possible reasons for Smith’s behavior and whether the Academy should discipline him. She said, “Just because you can explain it doesn’t mean that you should excuse it…We cannot have selected consequences to decide who gets punished and who doesn’t.”

Will Smith may one day receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, but it’s likely already being tarnished by the legacy of his recent Oscar-winning night behavior.

That’s my two cents, and I’m taking it to the bank.

 

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Entertaining Deep Thoughts

by on ·Food for Thought, Opinion, The Way I See It

“Quiet people have the loudest minds.” Stephen Hawking.

I read somewhere that the typical Pisces is extremely introspective. Don’t I know it. My brain seems to always be on hyperdrive, even when I’m sleeping in dreamland.

I contemplate everything. It baffles me that people spend hundreds of dollars on cut-out jeans simply because they are fashionable. And I wonder why birthdays are counted in years instead of days; especially since a day can sometimes seem like a lifetime. I humorously consider that someone who turns 50 on their birthday would be 18250 days old. Then, I imagine trying to fit those figures on a line on a form with only enough space for three digits.

Often my philosophy wavers between believing in predestination and the idea that we are all autonomous beings fueled by self-determination.

Some people ascribe to the doctrine that a Higher Power foreordains everything and that the script of our life is assigned when we are born. As we age, we think that we can control our destiny when we may not. What if we only believe that we have free will because part of the master plan is to let us think that we do?

Consider the epigraph The Appointment in Samarra. Are we always where we are supposed to be at any given time?

Another example. Say that a man is running late for an appointment. He rushes out of the building and anxiously tries to flag a taxi. A cab stops a couple of feet away from him. As he begins walking toward it, another man who had just approached the scene rudely rushes past the first man and hurries into the cab. The driver pulls off and proceeds on the green light into the intersection and is broadsided by a box truck that has run the light. Both the cab driver and passenger are badly injured. Was it predestination that the man from who the cab was stolen avoided the accident?

If someone commits suicide, was it predestined that the person would die that way, or was their free will, their intent to take control, the determining factor in when and how death would occur? Relevant to death, was euthanasia proponent Dr. Jack Kevorkian, an assigned architect of good or a force of evil? Everything is relative, isn’t it?

Do things unfurl in life the way they are supposed to, or is everything happenstance? Are our hopes, dreams, and plans already inbred or assigned to us before we are born, and do we merely follow the script once we are here?

I frequently consider how our thoughts, words, and actions, good or bad, sometimes have extensive reach. The things we say or do can benefit or harm others, often without our knowledge, subsequently a domino effect.

In these contemporary times, it seems that everything and everyone is interrelated far and wide. For example, random hookups that result in childbirths, artificial inseminations, and surrogacies make blood ties far-reaching. Consequently, brothers and sisters, cousins, and other blood relatives can unknowingly develop a physical or sexual love connection without knowing that they are related.

Occasionally, I entertain the idea that we, all of humankind, are on a universal chessboard. Depending on our social and economic status in life, we are the kings, queens, bishops, rooks, and pawns that provide entertainment for the omnipotent powers that be.

Sometimes I am inclined to agree with Shakespeare. Were he alive to paraphrase a line that he gave to Hamlet, he might say of my perpetual curiosity, “The lady doth overthink too much, methinks.”

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A Time to Laugh

by on ·Religion, The Way I See It

People joke about God having a sense of humor. I’ve done it, too. But, something happened to convince me that not only does God have a sense of humor, He sometimes uses humor to shake us up.

This morning – I am saying my a.m. prayers and have progressed to “hallowed be Thy name” when my mind begins to wander. Should I have Hazelnut or Arabica Dark Roast coffee with breakfast? Unfortunately, it is not unusual for my thoughts to stray when I’m saying my prayers. The Lord knows that I sometimes have the attention span of a two-year-old with ADD. I force myself to refocus and get back to the business at hand. I apologize to the Lord and start over as I always do whenever my prayer is interrupted.

“Our Father…” I get as far as “Thy will be done,” seconds before my cell phone pings on the nightstand beside the bed, indicating that I have a text message. I ignore the phone and apologize again for the interruption before restarting the prayer.

As I ask God to “Give us this day,” a loud, horn-honking car alarm goes off outside my bedroom window. Son of a biscuit eater, I think, then add Sorry, Lord.

I begin again and manage to finish praying without any more interruptions. And then the strangest thing happens. I turn on the TV to watch the news while making my bed. The set is tuned to the channel it was on when I turned it off last night. Grey’s Anatomy is on. Then comes the kicker.

Dr. Miranda Bailey (one of Grey’s key characters) stands before an altar holding glowing candles in the chapel. She stretches her arms to her sides, raises her head toward heaven, and begins to pray. She says, “Lord,” but before she can utter another word, a coworker arrives by her side and begins chattering. Although the intrusion is brief, Dr. Bailey’s frustration is evident. When the coworker leaves, Bailey turns back toward the altar and is about to resume her prayer.

“Lord,” she says again. Then she is interrupted by the phone inside the pocket of her smock. She pulls out the phone, glares at it, and sighs in frustration as the show goes to a commercial.

I am a little bit rattled by the parallel between what I just saw and my earlier experience while trying to finish my prayer. I pick up the remote control and change the channel while thinking how strange it was that the TV happened to be on that station and showing that particular scene. I don’t believe in coincidences. Surely, God was jesting, about my apologizing for the interruptions. In addition to wrath, mercy, and love, He does have a sense of humor.

Religion – like politics – is a touchy subject. Many people refrain from discussing those two topics because the conversation can turn from an interesting discussion to a nasty argument before you can say Hail Mary.

I am not a religious person, nor am I an atheist. I am spiritual. People who don’t understand my philosophy would likely label me a Christian atheist, but I reject that label.

Sometimes, when discussing the subject, I use the words religious and spiritual interchangeably because it’s easier and less time-consuming than explaining my viewpoint. As I see it, religion is a detailed tradition of organized beliefs and regulated practices shared by a like-minded community and often led and controlled by a person or person(s) who consider themselves called or appointed by God.

Being spiritual is having a one-on-one relationship with God or whatever one chooses to call the Supreme Being. Therefore, I do not feel compelled to have an intermediary or middle person – another imperfect mortal –interpret, explain, or orchestrate their understanding of the Higher Power to attempt to drive me to think their way.

People who claim to be spiritual instead of religious are not necessarily agnostic or atheist. On the contrary, many of us are God-fearing Christians. We just don’t want to be affiliated with religious institutions and groupthink that impacts people’s free will and common sense—shades of Jim Jones, David Koresh’s Branch Davidians, and Heaven’s Gate. And we do believe in prayer.

As author Stan Toler says, “You don’t necessarily need a great sense of humor to get God’s punch lines. You just need a great sense of faith.”

Amen.

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Creeping Normalcy

by on ·Food for Thought, Opinion, The Way I See It

Is there such a thing as normal anymore?  Or is normalcy, like beauty – in the eye of the beholder? I often wonder about that.

It was easier to comprehend things when I was much younger (darn near a hundred years ago). It didn’t require a rocket scientist mentality or a Ph.D. in political correctness to determine what was normal and what wasn’t. Back then, we learned in school that two plus two equals four. Nowadays, even that is arguable. Ask a scientist or mathematician, and that person might tell you that two plus two doesn’t necessarily equal four. Then, they’ll go on to explain that significant figures and rounding could produce a different answer. For gosh sake, I am not delving any further into that. Anyone who wants additional information about the quandary of two plus two had best start doing their research.

The conversion from normalcy to the existing status quo sometimes annoys me. Things that once fit neatly into boxes now bulge and punch holes through the container. I like the way a friend of mine described the situation when we were discussing it recently. He said, “Society is on the downstroke. The best days are behind us.”

My favorite television show is The View. The women on the program are intelligent, courageous, and outspoken. They don’t give a flying squirrel whether the public agrees with what they say, nor do they hold back on voicing their opinion. Even when they have a co-host or guest on the show whose ideas I strongly disagree with, who I feel is teetering on the border of idiocy, I still respect that person’s right to voice their opinion.

Like The View’s co-hosts, I am not bothered by people’s judgment of my viewpoint. However, I am astute enough to know that there are times when it is prudent to be diplomatic instead of shooting from the hip. I feel sorry for people who are so afraid of expressing what they honestly think because they fear that being candid will make them look bad, biased, or bonkers in the eyes of their relatives or friends. So, they suppress their true feelings and deny what they are really thinking. Then, later they silently fume about what they wish they had said. Been there. Done that. Years ago. Ain’t doing it no mo’. (Okay, I got a bit carried away there. But isn’t that the freedom of journaling?)

Getting back to the topic. I miss the days when if I received an unexpected wedding invitation from an acquaintance who I didn’t know very well, I didn’t have to wonder if it would be a heterosexual or same-sex marriage. Of course, the gender of the partners will not determine whether or not I attend the wedding. I don’t care who weds who. But, the fact that I don’t care about the gender of the couple doesn’t stop me from wondering. With the growing trend of parents giving their children unisex names, guessing the gender of someone’s S.O. isn’t as easy as it used to be. For example, if a wedding invitation reads, “… joyfully invite you to the wedding of Blair and Blake” or “the honor of your presence is requested at the marriage of Casey and Hunter,” there may be cause for pause. Suppose I want to buy the couple a set of engraved coffee mugs or embroidered gift towels; in order not to commit a faux pas, I need to know whether to buy “His and Hers, His and His or Hers and Hers.”

And look at families. As I see it, there is no such thing anymore as a normal family. Okay, I suddenly sense that using the word normal will be like pouring rubbing alcohol on a bleeding, open wound in some folks. So let’s strike it. Perhaps, in this instance, traditional is a more acceptable word to use. Traditional families like I used to see on TV programs during my generation’s younger days. Families like Father Knows Best, The Partridge Family, Good Times, and even The Jeffersons are what I mean by traditional families. They used to be referred to as nuclear families. I wonder, is the term “nuclear family” taboo now, too?

Traditional or contemporary families are more on par with This is Us and  Modern Family.

When I was a child, I had friends who may have had one or two step-siblings living in their home. Aside from the step-siblings, the children in the house all had the same last name. (Sometimes the step-kids did, too.) According to a study by Cassandra Dorius, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research, “One in five of all American moms have kids who have different birth fathers.” So, there could be as many as five or more children in today’s household, each carrying a different surname connected with their numerous baby daddies. I suspect that this is now considered normal; oops, I mean traditional.

Well, those are some of my thoughts about normalcy.

Dare I publish this? People might consider me unreasonable, narrow-minded, or biased; whatever adjective suits their fancy doesn’t faze me. But in judging me, I hope that they will acknowledge that I am sincere in expressing my beliefs and opinions. I refuse to cowardly straddle the line and pretend to be impartial when I have concrete feelings about something.

I’m sure that even my critics would agree that Charles Addams was on point when he wrote, “Normal is an illusion. What is normal for the spider is chaos for the fly.” With that – I do agree.

 

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The Second Time Around, It Ain’t a Song

by on ·COVID, Health, The Way I See It

In February, when I penned “Take the Shot – Or Not,” I was indecisive and disinclined to get the COVID  vaccination. My understanding of historical experiments and distrust of injections remains. However, like numerous others, I yielded to the pleading and the guidance of the CDC, the president, and medical professionals. My reaction to the first and especially the second vaccine reinforces the thought that lives in the attic of my mind – I am a human guinea pig.

Days before being vaccinated, I mentally prepared myself. I had to. I am trypanophobic. In layperson’s terms, that means scared as hell of needles.

I keep on top of reports about the vaccine, am aware of the possible side effects, and can recite pro-vac rhetoric like verse one of the Negro National Anthem.

“Every individual is different. Some people have no side effects,” the experts say. “Others have some reaction for a few days after receiving the second shot. It is a normal sign that the body is building protection. The reaction should go away after a few days,” they say. Yada, yada, yada. I know at least two people who had side effects not listed on the V-Safe datasheet I received when I got my shot.

Days before vac one, I began having nightmares about a nation of disfigured mutants roaming the streets—shades of the creatures in Michael Jackson’s Thriller video.

Bad dreams aside, I told myself that I would not have any side effects. It’s a simple issue of mind over matter. Wrong!

I decided to journal my experience, detailing my reaction from the first shot that I received on April 16 until a few days after the second shot on May 14.

First shot – Day 1

I arrive at the health center at my appointed time, 9:45 a.m., and am surprised that everything is well organized. Before administering the shot of Moderna vaccine, the nurse asks me which arm I prefer for the injection. “Left-arm.” I say. Although I am putting on a brave front, I am second-guessing my decision to take the shot. Why am I here? I ask myself. What possessed me to do this?

The nurse picks up a needle from a small table nearby and then turns toward me. As I roll up my short sleeve, I look at her. I look at the needle and little bottle in her hands. I look away. She swabs my arm near the shoulder and then squeezes it before sticking me. “You’re done,” She says. It must be her technique, I think. I hardly felt it. I am in and out of there in about 30 minutes. At home, I feel mild pain at the injection site and shrug it off, but then the ache gets intense and lasts about an hour. I also feel tired and nap on and off throughout the day. Drugged, I think before drifting into one doze.

Day 2 – The left arm is still a little sore, but the sting is bearable.

Day 3 – I am feeling fatigued and napping a lot. Something new has developed. Intermittent pain crops up in various places in my left arm between my shoulder and the wrist. The best way I can describe it is that it feels like the flash of pain you get when someone pinches you hard, and instead of immediately letting go of your skin, the person holds your flesh for several seconds before releasing it. I began calling it pinch-pain.

Day 4 – Still feeling occasional pinch-pain, only now it isn’t just in my left arm. It is ping-ponging throughout my body. It pings in one place, disappears, and then reappears someplace else. Ping! An ache near my elbow. Now gone. Ping! At my wrist. Gone. Ping! Pinch-pain in my left bicep. The pinch-pain is traveling and attacking a moving target – me.

Day 5 – I awaken between 4:30 and 5:30 a.m. The fatty area beneath my left arm close to my breast feels hot and achy. It is so painful that I go and get the ice pack from the freezer and apply it to the feverish area. This should not be happening, I tell myself. The underarm ache eases only to be replaced later that day with occasional muscle and joint pain. It is here and there:  left knee, right elbow, even the right side of my neck. Overall, I feel blah today, not just physically but mentally, too.

Day 6 – I am not my usual, perky self. I’ve been in a state of high anxiety since I got that shot nearly a week ago. To what do I attribute my now daily, familiar discomfort and the fact that I’ve been napping most days like Rip Van Winkle? I frequently find myself humming the tune of that old song by The Enchantments applying it to my body, “Something strange is happening. You don’t belong to me anymore.”

Day 7 – My body still feels foreign. I have a low tolerance for pain, and I start berating myself, asking why I went against my better judgment and took the shot? So, the current president and vice president got the injection on national TV. I love them and pray for them daily, but how do I know what, if anything, was injected into their arms? Might it have just been a stunt to lure the public to participate in the vaccine drive? I don’t mean to sound like a conspiracy theorist Republican, but how do I know that we are all – regardless of race or ethnicity – not unknowingly participating in some secret government study that will come to light years from now?

My antenna rises every time I hear a report that includes “we are studying vaccinated people…to see how long the vaccination last or when it wears off…to learn whether the vaccines work against emerging variants…when or if additional shots might be needed by people who have already had two.” The studies continue. The questions remain unanswered, and my anxiety level continues to rise.

One week to the day since my vaccination. I take no comfort in hearing news reports like the one this morning about a woman who died two weeks after taking the shot. Granted, she took the J&J vaccine, but there have also been reports of some deaths following the Pfizer and Moderna shots.

Throughout this process, I’ve been participating in the V-Safe (smartphone-based) after vaccination health checker. Via text, participants provide a daily update on how we are feeling. From a checklist of questions, we are to indicate if symptoms we feel are “mild, moderate, or severe.” I think they should include a “downright lousy” category because that’s how I’ve felt most of the time since being vaccinated. I pride myself on not being a pill popper, but my resistance is wearing down.

Day 9 – Last night, I had aches and pains all over my body. Again. WTF? I did not sign-up for this.

Day 10 – This afternoon, I ate two clementines, and both arms started itching mercilessly. I thought I was about to break out in hives. I often eat citrus fruit and have never been allergic to it, so what’s up with this strange development?

Day 11 – This morning I work up feeling like a Wakandan warrior. No pinch-pains. No blues. I feel like myself again. Wakanda forever! Then, darn! Here it is, afternoon, and the ache is back again in my upper left arm.

Day 12 – It is a dozen days since my first shot. The pain has subsided. Shhh, I must not think that out loud, but low energy and sleepiness hang on. A few more weeks to go before shot two. I think I’ll stop journaling about these episodes until then.

SECOND SHOT

Friday, May 14, 2021 – My anxiety level is off the charts. I almost change my mind about going back for the second vac, but I do it. As I take a seat beside the table, the administering nurse greets me and asks me how I am doing. “Nervous,” I say truthfully. “You will be okay,” she says. Easy for you to say. I think.

I remove my jacket, revealing my sleeveless arm. She tries to calm and humor me by engaging in pleasant conversation while preparing the needle. Before swabbing my arm, she asks, “Do you want someone to hold your hand?”

I say no thanks, but I’m thinking, is she for real?

“I’m serious.” She says as if reading my mind. “I can get someone if it will make you feel more relaxed.”

“No,” I say, “I’m good.” In addition to the nursing staff, at least 25 other masked people are seated at two additional vaccine stations and in chairs that are socially distanced around the waiting room and in the 15-minute recovery area. Periodically someone walks around the room and disinfects the empty chairs. There is no way that I, a grown-ass woman, will act like a big baby and have someone hold my hand in front of all of these people.

I know the process only takes a nanosecond, but as she prepares the needle, I am thinking about making a run for it until the mind reader says, “Sit still, please. Don’t move your arm.” I look away. Then she says, “Ready?” Before I can answer, she sticks me. I am not exaggerating when I say that the second injection hurt five times more than the first. She bandages the spot where she jabbed me. As she is capping the needle, she whispers, “There now. Do you want a lollipop?” I crack up laughing, and she laughs, too. Some folks seated nearby look at us to see what’s so funny.

Seven hours later, my arm is hurting like the dickens, and there is a slight metallic taste in my mouth. But I smile when I think about the lollipop question. I flex my arm periodically throughout the evening, hoping that bending and extending it at the elbow and doing wrist rotations will ease the pain. It only helps a little.

Day 2 – I had a terrible, sleepless night of tossing and turning. Trying to rest on my left side was impossible because it hurt whenever I rolled over on that arm. After dozing intermittently, I awake in the morning with every muscle, nook, and cranny in my body feeling like I have been run over by a bus. I take the V-Safe datasheet from the nightstand and read it to see if there are any instructions on what to do when you feel like you have one foot in the grave. Exercise is one of the things listed. It takes every ounce of energy I can muster to pull myself out of bed and then to work out for an hour. I do cardio, stationary biking, and stretching. After I finish exercising, I say to heck with my anti-pill attitude, and surrendering to my pain, I take an Advil. Soon, on a scale of one to ten, with one being the worse pain and ten being total relief, I’ve ascended to eight. Advil is doing its job.

Day 3 – I wake up feeling good. I work out again. This time I skip the painkiller.

Day 4 – Hmm, no, ill effects this morning either.

Today is a week and a day since shot two. Right now, I’m feeling back to normal. I hope that what my daughter refers to as my vaccine hangover has finally ended and I am back on the wagon. I am not ashamed to admit that for a while, it had me down for the count. This warrior may whine, but she doesn’t go easily.

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