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mothermaidenclone-blog · 5 years

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Ad Astra or This Movie Was the Brad Pitts

Ad Astra was the worst movie I have paid to see since 2015’s Kill Your Friends, which is my least favourite cinema experience of all time. It was a dry and dreary story about emotionally stunted white men in a bleak and boring capitalist version of space, with jarring and superfluous Christian undertones. The plot and everyone’s motives were so non-existent that Brad Pitt had to narrate the whole thing in a monotone so flat and dead I literally screamed all the way from the cinema to the bus stop when it was over, partly out of a frustration so deep it was non-verbal, but also just to finally hear some pitch variation.

*Ad Astra spoilers follow*

There technically were women in this movie. Lots of women, particularly women of colour, occupied high ranking positions and were addressed by their titles, a touch I think is important and that usually tips the scales in favour of a good review for me. We were graced with Adjutant General Vogel (LisaGay Hamilton), Captain Lu (Freda Foh Shen), Sergeant Romano (Kimmy Shields), Tanya Pincus (Natasha Lyonne) and Lorraine Deavers (Kimberly Elise), as well as several unnamed female personnel (Kayla Adams, Elisa Perry, Sasha Compère and Mallory Low). I would like to particularly highlight Natasha Lyonne’s performance as apparently she was the only actor employed to play a human being and not a replicant. She was on screen for maybe twenty seconds, as is sadly the case with most of these women, but was a glorious breath of fresh air as the only character to simultaneously emote expressively and speak with inflection and enthusiasm. The only one! In a two hour movie!

All of these women appear to be respected and capable members of various illustrious teams, but are always outnumbered by men. There are two male generals alongside Vogel and Deavers is initially outnumbered 4:1 on her space craft by men. Tragically, whenever a team is being picked off, it is always the people of colour who die first. Not only is this obviously racist, it is just a disgusting cliché that we just don’t need to see anymore in movies. Deavers dies first when Roy (Brad Pitt) forcibly invades their vehicle, followed by Franklin Yoshida (Bobby Nish), an Asian man, and Donald Stanford (Loren Dean), a white guy, is the last to go. Roy cradles him in his arms and attempts to save his life. I hope it’s not just me that sees something wrong with the order of events there.

A similar scenario takes place in the lunar chase, which absurdly seems to occur in the same crapy looking buggies as the original moon landing, a confusing visual choice considering we’ve just seen a vast and impressive modern concrete moon base. The film takes the time to introduce us to Willie Levant (Sean Blakemore), a black officer who will be escorting Ray across the moon. As soon as we see he has a photo of his wife and child taped to his tablet screen I knew he was going to die - in the year 2019 I should not be able to predict that a black character is going to die because we saw a family photo. Can we just not anymore? Again, aside from the racism, that’s just shitty writing. I like to think that as a species, if we can conceptualise something as vast and seemingly impossible as solar travel, we can also move beyond basic and derogatory cinematic tropes.

I was most excited by the appearance of Helen Lantos (Ruth Negga), a woman of colour who occupies a position of power on Mars and introduces herself assertively using her full name. Also, her whole look was excellent. However, this brief release of serotonin was very short lived as she literally walks Roy down a corridor then is immediately cut off and superseded by a white guy with a man bun. Lantos does return later, but alas, as an exposition machine to give Roy some plot news about his dad. Even as she explains that her parents were murdered by his, Lantos falls victim to the dire, emotionless monotone that I can only assume was forced on the entire cast of this film. Then, she is an actual chauffeur and drives Ray to a manhole so he can continue his dad quest. A character brimming with original potential is presented as nothing more than a device.

The final woman to mention is the first one we see, Roy’s ex-wife Eve (Liv Tyler). We see the blurry, out of focus back of her head in the background of a shot before we see her face, and this is incredibly telling, because that’s all Eve is, the simulacrum of a woman. She could be anybody - so why she is Liv Tyler defies belief, I can only assume they held her loved ones hostage - her story is untold and entirely irrelevant. Again, she is only a device, although this time not for Roy’s forward momentum, but this time seemingly to emphasise that Roy is a total sociopath with no emotions whatsoever. We don’t learn Eve’s name for another twenty minutes, and it is an hour and twenty minutes before we hear her speak. Even then, it’s not a live conversation, because god forbid this film have too many of those, but a voice recording explaining that their relationship is over. I’m not going to lie, I’m pretty sure that’s what it was, but everything she said was so generic I have no memory of it whatsoever. She is presented as a ghost, a blurry image on a screen, a memory fixed in time, not a real person with agency and personality. At the end of the movie we finally see her in real time, and that is when she has made the unfathomable decision to meet Roy for coffee. Even her face in that moment gives no emotion away, perhaps because Tyler had no idea how to act this entirely nonsensical decision. To our knowledge, she would not have seen any change in Roy, only received news that he survived a dangerous space mission, which is apparently enough of a reason to get back with this emotionless egg of a man?

I almost didn’t want to devote words to them, but I think it’s important to address just how dire Roy and his dad H. Clifford McBride (Tommy Lee Jones) are. This is their film, they are the reason that all of these women’s stories are passed over. It is made clear over and over again that both Roy and Clifford believe they are the only people capable of completing their various missions. Roy hijacks a ship and inadvertently kills everyone on board because he thinks that it’s his destiny or whatever to get his dad back, never mind that they were all highly trained space personnel who were arguably better suited to the mission precisely because it wasn’t their dad. Clifford straight up murders his whole crew because they are too “small minded” to fly off further and further into space forever on a mission that has yet yielded absolutely no evidence of their goals. A variety of talented human beings are destroyed because of the entitlement of white men, their delusional and unshakable conviction that they are at the centre of the universe and that no one else could possibly accomplish the lofty goals that kismet apparently calls them to.

The way they speak about themselves and to each other is absolutely psychotic. Roy’s solo musings include, “The flight recorder will tell the story, but history will have to decide,” and “In the end, the son suffers the sins of the father.” Clifford imparts his son with the delightful greeting of, “There was never anything there for me, I never cared for you or your mother or your small ideas.” In addition, they both physically flinch from human contact at various points in the move. Now, I totally understand that we live in a neurodiverse world and that many people experience emotions and social interactions in any number of ways, and that is a beautiful thing that makes our world so interesting to live in. However, that these men both abjectly state that they have no empathy is presented within the context of their megalomaniacal ideals that they must accomplish their god-given quests irregardless of how many people they have to kill along the way. It is a facet of their strangely two-dimensional, arrogant and narcissistic personalities, not one part of many complex features that make a complete and relatable human being.

Roy has to literally say out loud that he is a human being at the end of the movie; “I will rely on those closest to me…I will live and love,” which makes him sound more like a learning AI trying to pass a Turing test than anything else. The music swells as Clifford throws himself towards the surface of Neptune in an orchestral deluge that is unsubtly significant in this very quiet film, as though I’m supposed to start crying and think anything other than, “well thank fuck, it’s about time this murderer dies in the cold vacuum of space, I hope Roy stays spinning and screaming here forever too.” We are supposed to feel sympathy for them as the heroes of this movie, despite the fact that they show no care for anyone else throughout the whole thing and act entirely in their own self interests.

Overall, the women in this film are given about five seconds of potential as they introduce themselves variously as decorated soldiers and otherwise capable personnel, before being shoved to the side, or murdered, for Roy. This is obviously objectionable, but is made so much worse by the fact that Roy is an emotionless, entitled, empathy-less white man who doesn’t care if other people have to die for him to get what he wants. That is what these women are being passed up in favour of. I felt like I was watching a two hour long Voight-Kampff test. Space movies like this should be about what we can achieve if we work together as a species, not about how white men will still be the kings of dreary capitalism, even on the moon. We can do better than this.

And now for some asides:

What the actual fuck was the font at the beginning? I guess a red serif all caps should have alerted me to the fact that I was about to watch a horror movie.

As a lover of space horror, I was absolutely gutted that it was a bad CG angry baboon and not a cool gross alien. Also, what was that scene? “Hmm, we need to get rid of this loser because Brad Pitt is the best at space ships and he needs to be the captain. Uhh…what about…space monkeys? Yeah! Space monkeys on a deserted Norwegian ship. That makes sense.”

Can I just have a film bout those moon pirates fighting space capitalism please? I was more invested in them that anyone else in this garbage movie.

Credit for the Bradd Pitts joke goes to the talented and lovely Ed Cheverton

#ad astra #Film Review #movie review #feminism #sci-fi #scifi #science fiction #brad pitt #liv tyler #tommy lee jones #ruth negga #freda foh shen #lisagay hamilton #natasha lyonne

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torreygazette · 5 years

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Precarious Love : The Costs of Agency in Regency Literature

“Women are supposed to be very calm generally, but women feel just as men feel; they need exercise for their faculties, and a field for their efforts as much as their brothers do; they suffer from too rigid a restraint, too absolute a stagnation, precisely as men would suffer.” - Jane Eyre

For many women, the definition of personal power includes the ability to maintain autonomy and ownership over their life choices, their physicality, and their personal boundaries. Unlike centuries of women before us, we are legally capable of supporting ourselves in essentially any way we choose. First World women are no longer obligated to be dependent on the men in their lives for identity or security, a shift that has adjusted and balanced out the deep vulnerability and hazards inherent in being a woman.

Many of us take this level of agency for granted and read classic literature through this lens. We swoon over romances and love stories while forgetting that, for authors such as Jane Austen or the Brontë sisters, romance actually came second to economic and physical survival. The female protagonists of their novels are not just concerned about love but must gamble on their prospects of security and safety while navigating an unmistakable power imbalance, tipped distinctly in favor of the men. Classic literature written by women and about women often details the struggle to maintain personal autonomy in a world where women are entirely dependent on the good graces of men. These stories make an impact because their protagonists are portrayed fighting for their own dignity while having to navigate their survival through one of the only “respectable” avenues open to them — marriage.

Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice touches on the risk of poverty the Bennet sisters face should they remain unmarried. That tension heightens the shock of Elizabeth’s turning down Darcy’s initial proposal. Darcy feels little need to accommodate Elizabeth’s own wants or desires because he instinctively knows she has very little choice in how her life plays out should she remain single. When she does reject him, she does so knowing her vulnerability to the whims of the generosity from extended family has increased exponentially. What Austen does not detail, however, is what those risks include. Her stories remain comfortably in upper society, and her women have the leeway to assert themselves without putting themselves too far in the way of direct harm.

Charlotte Brontë is different. Everyone who loves gothic romance knows the plot of Jane Eyre - feisty governess falls for brooding hero, sparks fly, tragic secret is revealed, despair sets in, followed by eventual reconciliation. What can easily slip through the cracks, however, is the precarious position Jane finds herself in as soon as that tragic secret is revealed. Jane Eyre stands next to Austen’s Elizabeth in her conviction that she matters, that her self respect is worthy; she lays claim to the right to be treated in accordance to that worth. But unlike Elizabeth, she is a working girl with no known living relatives, with limited life experience, no resources, and living in a house shared with her employer and former fiancé—a man whose past is littered with mistresses he discarded as soon as they no longer pleased him. When Elizabeth, as a decently high-status woman of reputation, initially turns Darcy down, she risks genteel poverty. When Jane, a lower class unknown, rejects the idea of bigamy or becoming Rochester’s mistress, she finds herself threatened with rape.

This is, I believe, the actual crux of the novel. When Darcy is confronted by Elizabeth’s self-respect, he is jolted into seeing her as a true equal and begins to adjust accordingly. In contrast, Brontë establishes this equality for Jane early on. Although Rochester has a history of pettiness, emotional manipulation, and self-absorption, Jane’s commitment to her own value, humanity and self-worth has already forced him to view her as his intellectual equal. By the climax of the novel, Jane has already resisted his efforts to reshape her into the colorful angel of his dreams, and, in a world where women were expected to acquiesce to their husbands without question, has insisted upon remaining herself even as his fiancee. “I will not be your English Celine Varens…. I will furnish my own wardrobe…and you shall give me nothing but your regard: and if I give you mine in return, that debt will be quit.” With his previous mistresses, Rochester amused himself with living distractions. With Jane, Rochester grows to love and respect an actual, fellow human being.

But unlike Elizabeth’s ability to hold her head high and send Darcy on his way, intellectual equality with Rochester does not change the fact that Jane is a lower class governess with few rights, something Rochester is keenly aware of. One of the most famous quotes of Jane Eyre, “I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself…. there I plant my foot,” is Jane’s internal response to Rochester’s attempts to blame and manipulate Jane into taking responsibility for his potential self-destruction should she persist in refusing his offers. Seeing her resolve nearly sends Rochester over the edge:

“Never,” said he, as he ground his teeth, “never was anything at once so frail and so indomitable…. I could bend her with my finger and thumb, and what good would it do if I bent, if I uptore, if I crushed her?.... Whatever I do to its cage, I cannot get at it…. If I tear, if I rend the slight prison, my outrage will only let the captive loose. Conqueror I might be of the house, but the inmate would escape to heaven before I could call myself possessor of its clay dwelling place. And it is you, spirit - with will and energy, and virtue and purity - that I want, not alone your brittle frame… seized against your will you will elude the grasp like an essence.”

No one would have come to Jane’s rescue had Rochester decided to take revenge for his disappointment. He knew it and Jane knew it. But Rochester also knows that although Jane is physically powerless, he cannot escape the fact she is far more than something to be used and tossed aside. He has seen her as an independent individual, and, because he has seen her deep humanity, he cannot go back. He lets her go, unharmed.

Once Jane and Rochester are reunited at the end of the novel, Jane has inherited enough wealth that she now has the ability to walk away from any situation she pleases without personal cost. Should she marry now, it will be entirely her own decision. She is no longer dependent on a husband or a deeply vulnerable governess position to support herself and can choose to live her life as she pleases. In this context, Rochester confesses that he absolutely did intend to rape her. “I did wrong: I would have sullied my innocent flower - breathed guilt on its purity.” He repents, she forgives, and, knowing she is now secure in both herself and in his genuine respect, she steps into his life as his wife. It is doubtful that Elizabeth shared cultural power with Darcy outside of the confines of their home, but Rochesters’s new blindness spares him the cultural shame that would have otherwise followed his sharing control and power with Jane. Brontë writes their story in a way that makes shared power in marriage palatable to an unfamiliar audience, and, potentially, eventually accepted as normal.

Jane Eyre is widely regarded as a masterpiece, showcasing female agency in a world where such things were relatively unknown, but often we find the happiness and satisfaction of the story in the triumphant, “Reader, I married him.” But this is not what Brontë is actually going for. The marriage plot was a commonly relatable, easily digestible storyline; Jane’s fierce independence throughout was not.

Changing cultural narratives takes years of careful work, framed in non-threatening ways, in subversive methods, easily misunderstood or overlooked. Brontë worked to change the culture in the only way she could: introducing a new concept into a known narrative, marriage, using a high-risk scenario, vulnerable governess and powerful master where abuse was essentially expected, and shifted that story instead into a marriage of intellectual equals. Brontë introduced England to a quietly subversive notion—women are human and deserve the same respect and regard as their male counterparts. Jane’s refusal to compromise exposed her to severe risk and harm, something well known to Brontë’s female peers, but also granted her something most could only dream about: a marriage of mutual regard, respect, and shared power. What a concept.

#Literature #Jane Eyre #Jane Austen

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firefighterkingdom · 4 years

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# 14 – Detective Aaron Velarde | Bernalillo County Sheriff Department

Detective Aaron Velarde from the Bernalillo County Sheriff Department (BCSD) is our guest today. BCSD has a long history with the Bernalillo County Fire Department (BCFD) and our host Robert Sanchez.

They discuss the long inter-agency relationship and how law enforcement and the fire service interact on a regular basis from emergency response and crime response to department cooperation.

Robert Sanchez: Hey, we’re back today. Robert Sanchez, I’m the host of Firefighter Kingdom with my co-host Vince Trujillo. Today we have a good thing in store for us. Today we have a Detective Det. Aaron Velarde from Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Department. And we’re here to talk about just being in the community with the fire department and law enforcement, especially the Sheriff’s department that we work in the community, how we have a great relationship, which I know, most people in the public might wonder how our relationship is. The way I look at it is we treat them as one of our own. So again welcoming Detective Det. Aaron Velarde from Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Department. What are you up to Aaron?

Det. Aaron Velarde: Hi Robert, first, I want to say thanks for having me on, and I think this is a great program you have going here, and I’m happy to be a part of it.

Robert Sanchez: Yeah I’m glad to have you. And so Aaron I’ve had the unique privilege, for you to be… We’ve been friends for a while, man, for a long time.

Det. Aaron Velarde: For a long time.

Robert Sanchez: We’ve probably been on the department of almost the same time as on the departments, and just since I was a rookie just running calls with you man, it’s been a privilege. We’ve had some crazy things happen, man.

Det. Aaron Velarde: We’ve had some fun for sure.

Robert Sanchez: Yeah. So, I mean, we could write a book about it and I would say, I think it’d be a best seller sometimes, about the unique situations we’ve got ourselves in or we’ve got into. But we’re still alive, man, so that’s a good thing. So I just wanted to talk about sometimes people, the public or the community asks me sometimes “How do law enforcement and the fire department work together?”

And all I can give them is my perspective. I’ve been fortunate enough to work with the men and women of Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Department and being a Lieutenant in Bernalillo County Fire Department, just the interaction I have with the sheriff’s department is always a good thing. I always feel comfortable around the sheriff’s department and when you guys are there I know you guys have our backs, and we know if we get into a sticky situation there’re members of the public that sometimes they want to assault us for what reason I don’t know, but they want to assault us. And sometimes we get assaulted and definitely take verbal abuse, but it’s a job we signed up for and we learned to deal with it.

But I know you guys are always there to help us out when we need you guys. If we call you guys for help, you guys are there as quick as possible. And I also know that you guys, when you call for us, we’re there as quick as possible, and we’re giving you the best medical attention we could give and if needed in unfortunate circumstances, we’re getting you guys to the hospital as quick as possible. And I know Bernalillo County, we transport you ourselves, and we’re proud to do it. So I just I feel that, we’re a well greased machinery when we’re working together, man. I just think we’re great together.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Absolutely. I’ll be the first to say it, having you guys working with us and having such a good working relationship I know a lot of other agencies don’t have that. I think we’re fortunate in the county to have had that and continue to have that it’s one of those things where currently with the state of everything there’s a lot of things in the back of an officer’s mind when they show up on a call, and it’s a little bit of comfort to know that if something bad does happen, you guys are close by, it’s absolutely one of the things that we consider on a daily basis. And I’ve gone to some hot calls that I was grateful that your guys were right behind us, because you don’t know what’s going to happen when you get there.

Robert Sanchez: Absolutely, and we enjoy doing it especially in this time of 2020. I made a joke the other day, like Marty from a Back to the Future. I hope he doesn’t go to 2020, because he doesn’t want to go to 2020 man the way it is. Especially all the rioting and unrest that’s happening right now and just the political environments. It’s crazy. So I feel just lately on some calls that we’ve been on, it just seems more tense. It seems like everybody’s more in a tense situation and the political environment that’s happening today in the United States and the unrest that’s happening.

So we always count on you guys being there and we work hand-in-hand together and we do a great job. I think we treat the community well, we accomplish our goals that we go out to accomplish when we get a 911 call, and we do it with respect and dignity to the community. We treat people the same way. That’s why I like to tell my crews is “You treat the homeless person the same way you treat the CEO of a corporation and you’re going to be just fine,” and I think we do that.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Absolutely. I think one of the things that’s often overlooked is we’re part of the community also. We’re not going to allow somebody to mistreat a member of the public, because for all I know they could be doing that later on with one of my family members or somebody I know. And we both know in our professions that we’re not going to tolerate that.

Robert Sanchez: Absolutely.

Det. Aaron Velarde: I think that’s what fosters that good environment that we have within this county. And we don’t have a lot of the incidents and issues that some of these other jurisdictions have with that, because just like the rest of New Mexico, man, we’re different and we’re a family here, so we all stick together and we look out for each other.

Robert Sanchez: Right. Well, absolutely man and I do have compassion for law enforcement these days. I mean, it’s tough for you guys. It just seems like every situation, every position you guys are put in and actually you guys do is being scrutinized by everybody. Everybody’s watching, everybody has a camera on their phone nowadays and they’re filming a video in every single time, which isn’t a bad thing, but sometimes you only get a little bit of the situation what really happened. And I see that happen a ton of times where it looks like it’s not very good, but they don’t know the 20 minutes before what led up to what’s happening. And I give you guys a lot of credit. In this environment in 2020, it’s very tough for you guys to do your job.

Det. Aaron Velarde: It is. And it’s increasingly difficult. I mean, we always knew signing up for this kind of work that public service, it’s a high stress job. You’re going to be under a microscope and you should be, you’re out there serving the public and interacting with people in a different capacity than a normal person interacts with somebody a daily basis. Our whole philosophy with law enforcement is your worst day is our every day. People rarely call the police just to say hi. They usually call us when there’s something bad happening or something bad has already happened, and now we have to respond to that and take care of the issue.

So I think to lend a little bit of perspective from the law enforcement side to help the community understand we’re people too, we do things a certain way because that’s how we’ve been trained to do things. And when you have somebody critiquing your every move, especially with the camera on scene, as things are unfolding, it’s a very dynamic situation. And the officer has a whole lot of other things playing out in their mind that they need to be cognizant of on that scene for their safety and the safety of everybody else involved.

Robert Sanchez: Right. Well said, sometimes I think the public that looks at firefighters, even law enforcement more, they have to remember we’re human, like everybody else and we have feelings, we have emotions like everybody else. And at the end of the day, our goal is to go home to our family.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Absolutely.

Robert Sanchez: To make sure our coworkers or the members of the Sheriff’s department or members of the fire department that they go home safe. I know my job as an officer on the firetruck is to make sure that my crew goes home safe. That I’m making good decisions and not putting them in bad situations. And I know you guys are in the same, so yeah I want the community to know. I think sometimes even before I got in the fire department, it’s weird. You look at the police and fire department, sometimes they’re not human but we are, we work, and we go home for our family like everybody else. We go coach our sons or daughters baseball or softball games or football, or we take them to dance class or soccer or whatever the case may be. So we have a family outside of our job, so it’s good for the community to hear that. And you know what, and you’re going to have problems in every department, so one bad apple in the bunch.

Det. Aaron Velarde: And that’s true of any profession. If you’re going to critique professions, let’s do it fairly and look at them all across the board. I mean, you have bad pilots, just like you have bad doctors. People die of medical malpractice all the time. It doesn’t make it acceptable. It just means it happens. That’s true of any profession that you look at. You’re always going to have one or two bad apples, but for the most part, the majority of those professions are good people.

Robert Sanchez: Absolutely. I mean, I don’t know the total statistics and facts of it, but I mean, I would say 99% of law enforcement is they’re good men and women that serve their community. You know what I mean? And same with firefighters and 99% of firefighters are good and they’re trustworthy and they’re serving the community. So that’s why I like to tell people who come and ask us stuff like that. But again, man, I appreciate the job that you guys do, and sometimes I feel for you guys and you guys are in a tough time right now, and it’s tough for you guys to do a good job.

Det. Aaron Velarde: I appreciate that, and we appreciate you guys doing what you do also. Like I said for us it’s definitely a little bit of comfort knowing that you’re going to that call or you’re going through that door, and you don’t know what’s on the other side. But I’ve also seen the work that you guys do firsthand with the community, responding to accidents. Some of these other calls that most people don’t give you enough credit for that happen on a daily basis. Everybody wants to go to that hot call where it’s a shooting or a stabbing, but man, you guys have far more interaction with the community, taking care of people on accident scenes, heart attacks, medical calls, and you guys do a great job. I can say firsthand from the work I’ve seen you guys are one of the top agencies in the country.

Robert Sanchez: Well, thank you very much, man. I can say the same for you, man. Again I’m proud to serve amongst the men and women of Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Department, and it’s a true honor. And thank you for what you guys do.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Thank you.

Robert Sanchez: Alright Detective Velarde and I call you Aaron my friend, man. So I was just curious, how did you get involved in the sheriff’s department? Did you want to be in law enforcement all your life or just ran into it? How did that work out?

Det. Aaron Velarde: It’s funny, it was a gradual progression. My grandfather was in law enforcement, my dad was actually a firefighter.

Robert Sanchez: Right for real. Albuquerque Fire, right?

Det. Aaron Velarde: Albuquerque Fire.

Robert Sanchez: He was the only smart one.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Right. So, growing up around it, public service was something I knew I wanted to do. I just wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. And going through college I had a few bad experiences with law enforcement at the time, and nothing too crazy, but it was one of those things where I figured one good cop would have probably made a big difference. And so I started looking more at the law enforcement side of things, and my father with his career in the fire department was actually an arson investigator towards the end of his career. And the investigative part always fascinated me. So as I got older and progressed through college, I decided that it was something that I was looking at a little more and decided when I was 24 years old that it’s now or never, I think I need to get in there and at least do my part and try and make my community a little bit better of a place, and the rest they say is history.

Robert Sanchez: Sure. Well, thank you for that man. That’s that’s nice, man. So how long have you been in the sheriff’s department?

Det. Aaron Velarde: I’ve been with them 13 and a half years now and 11 and a half of that was all on patrol.

Robert Sanchez: Right. So you’re really in there working. Sometimes I think being in the field man is the better part of the job sometimes, you know what I mean?

Det. Aaron Velarde: Yeah. It’s definitely a place to learn. It’ll teach you a lot in a short time.

Robert Sanchez: They’ve got a lot of life lessons for sure.

Det. Aaron Velarde: A lot of life experience.

Robert Sanchez: Learning what not to do, I think. Yeah. So now you’re a detective and you’re working out of the metro detention center. Is that correct?

Det. Aaron Velarde: I work out of downtown and MDC 50/50, but my responsibilities up there are basically investigating anything that comes out of the jail as far as criminal charges, and any other special investigations that are assigned as well as gathering intelligence from up there, which that place is a wealth of.

Robert Sanchez: Oh, okay. So basically crimes that actually happen in the facility you guys also do those and then crimes that happen outside, but getting intelligence on information to prosecute. Is that…

Det. Aaron Velarde: Correct? Yeah.

Robert Sanchez: Okay. That’s probably a lot of work in itself.

Det. Aaron Velarde: It is. Yeah. There’s four people in my unit and there’s a couple thousand inmates, so there’s never a dull moment around that place.

Robert Sanchez: Sure, sure. And you were talking about earlier just in 2020s it’s a tough time has been, and so how is it? I was just thinking man that we talked about how hard it must be to be an officer right now, and how hard is it and how different is it right now in these times of unrest and protesting and rioting? How is it for law enforcement always being scrutinized? I mean, what do you notice that’s different?

Det. Aaron Velarde: Well, I think a lot has changed with the recent events that happened. And I wish I could say it was for the better, but the state of morale with our guys, it’s a tough enough job already, and now you have the public creating this external pressure. It’s tough for a guy that’s already having a bad day to get up, go to work the next morning and have a 15 year old kid at a bus stop, flipping them off just for being a cop. That stuff weighs on you throughout the day, and it’s something that our guys shouldn’t have to experience.

We understand that we’re not always going to be liked just by the nature of this job. I mean, you’re taking away people’s freedom at times and you’re putting them in handcuffs and taking them to jail. Part of that is we signed up for the responsibility and we do that to protect people’s rights, not so much to violate them. And I think if the public knew that we’re out there looking out for them, just as we’re looking out for that 15 year old kid flipping us off. That’s his first amendment right, and he has the right to do that because we’re out there protecting those rights.

Robert Sanchez: Sure. Yeah. I mean, at the end of the day unfortunately there’re times you had to put people in handcuffs, but I mean, it’s all in public safety, man. It’s all about protecting the public. So and I can understand how it can take a toll and it’s tough. I mean, especially in this political environment, and I’m not going to get into Democrat, Republican thing, but it’s just a political environment in general it’s just, you feel that tension man, when you’re out there and you just feel it, even when we’re on calls, you just feel the tension’s different, something’s different.

Det. Aaron Velarde: It’s there and it adds a different element to what we have to think about especially with officer involved shootings, obviously those are something we never want to have happen, because nobody wants to have that on their conscience. Nobody wants to take a life even if it’s done in the most righteous of circumstances, that’s still something that you’re going to have to ultimately live with the rest of your life, and the aftereffects of that, which I’ve seen firsthand, even as a union president. We respond to those incidents and I’ve seen the toll it takes on a family.

I’ve had guys that have been in those circumstances and tell me, “Man my kids saw what happened on the news. My kid’s looking at me differently because I was forced to shoot somebody.” Nobody wants that in their life. So it’s tough, and then when you create this external pressure around that, now you have these guys second guessing themselves in critical situations where really you don’t have that time to be second guessing. You have to take action and do what you’re trained to do for everybody’s safety.

Robert Sanchez: I mean, so you’re having to make split second decisions and you have to make them right. And you can’t make a mistake, so that’s just tough. You have to make quick decision or it’s your life. It could be your life. You know what I mean?

Det. Aaron Velarde: Absolutely.

Robert Sanchez: I could see in these times in law enforcement, it’s tough for you guys and-

Det. Aaron Velarde: You know very well working in public safety, you guys have it on the fireside too. You can do everything right, and still have a bad outcome. That’s just the nature of this job.

Robert Sanchez: Yeah. I mean, sometimes you can give it all your all and the results aren’t always what you want them to be unfortunately. And just talking about even being in Bernalillo County or the City of Albuquerque now just some of the types of calls that we go on together. In the United States, I mean, there’s just a huge massive amount of drug calls or overdoses calls that we go on quite a bit, and I’m seeing more and more of them unfortunately. What do you think? You’ve seen a rise in that even in the jail probably arrests are mostly drug charges and the people in jail. So, I mean, drugs are just plaguing our community in a wrong way.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Even before I had left the field overdoses were always high. That was one of the top calls that we responded to. And obviously drugs are a huge problem in this community, but I think we’re starting to see within our community that the manifestation of bigger problems within our society. I think that’s what a lot of this culminates in is we definitely have some issues in our culture in our society that we need to address.

Robert Sanchez: Right. Well, I mean, you see it in some of the cases where children are raised in an environment that’s infested with drugs to begin with, and so they get to the adult level and they’re already starting off on the wrong foot and to no fault of their own sometimes. So they get involved in drugs and it just turns bad from there. They get involved in gangs, it’s really bad from there. But now you have the opioid addiction which any prominent member of society, you have CEO’s that had back surgery and knee surgery and they’re taking pain meds, and they just get addicted to them and it leads to heroin and it leads to addiction, and it leads to overdose, it leads to losing your family, losing your house. I mean, it’s a big problem.

We see it every day, and people forget but we’re reminded on a daily basis because we go to work and see it. So that’s the part of the community I feel sorry for, because sometimes in my opinion, you know I’m not an expert in drug counseling or anything like that, but I see it where you have people in the community that are prominent. They’re doing a great job, they’re raising their family, they have a good place to live for their family, and then they just lose it all because of a surgery on pain meds and opiates, and then they start searching for it. And some people have different addictive personalities. So some people, it happens to some it doesn’t. So it’s not only the unfortunate people who are raised in a drug abuse environment. It’s also prominent people that get involved sometimes by accident not on fault of their own sometimes.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Sure. Yeah. That’s what makes drugs so destructive is they can happen to anybody. I think one of the bigger issues that we need to look at also is this system has basically normalized drug use. So you have these kids now on TV they turn on a TV and kids are very impressionable. They see this stuff taking place on TV shows they watch, and to them in that world, it’s normal. If they’re seeing it on TV and mom and dad are doing it, or brother or cousin are doing it, and that’s the environment that they’re in, of course, to them, it’s going to seem normal. And I think we needed intervention at earlier stages for these kids to try and break that cycle.

Robert Sanchez: Absolutely. Well I think Bernalillo County Sheriff’s and Bernalillo County Fire Department, I think they do a good job in educating the public. They have good programs out there for PR relations for public relations getting the public involved, learning about safety and fire. This week’s fire prevention week learning about the safety of that. And also how you guys serve the community, even going out to these parade birthday parties that you’re going out to, and I know you guys join us in that, and seeing the smile on kids’ faces doing that. So hopefully we can get more involved in the community where if unfortunately if the children are involved, their family’s involved in drug addiction, that they don’t inherit themselves and to grow into drug addiction themselves. So, I mean, that’s our goal, and I think it does work.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Absolutely, and I think the public needs to understand that the biggest community activists are your guys in uniform when police and fire show up on the scenes of these overdose calls, we’re the first ones telling kids or family members not to do that thing. They need to make some changes, and take care of themselves.

Robert Sanchez: Learn from the mistakes, and it’s no joke, man. It really could happen. And it’s a crazy time, we talked about it, I mean, these times and George Floyd, the incident with George Floyd, it’s just been crazy and just being the involvement with law enforcement the scrutiny that law enforcement is taking. So what’s your take on that whole thing, man? That’s pretty crazy.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Yeah. I mean, it was a very tragic event. And of course, anytime you have a loss of life, it’s tragic. But a lot of people get caught up in the aftereffects of it when they need to be looking at what led up to it. Obviously as a culture in America, we’ve deviated from the rule of law and if people would comply and basically let the court system work that out. We have one of the greatest court systems in the world and a constitution and bill of rights that ensure those things. Even if you don’t agree at the time, if you think that the cop is doing something in error, there’re checks and balances, and there’s a system in place through the courts to sort that out.

And I think a lot of times people overreact, which leads to overreaction on the other side as well, but then you get into the deeper issues of police funding and training and that thing. And it’s a whole picture that we have to look at. We can’t just take one incident or bits and pieces of other incidents and try and make something of it. You have to stick a step back and look at the entire picture, and decide how we can fix things or where we went wrong and what needs to be changed.

Robert Sanchez: Sure. So there are steps in place for a reason and also due process, in other words.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Due process absolutely.

Robert Sanchez: We let it play out in confidence hopefully in the agency at the time is doing the correct things with investigating and discipline and making sure the employee gets due process and on any event. Which is tough. You look at both sides Republican Democrat, and I’m not going to get into whatever side, but I’m just saying, everyone’s just at each other’s throats it’s just, like I said, it’s just there’s tension in the air on both sides. And I think there can be change on both sides to make the community come together, and be a stronger community, and hopefully we learn from this and hopefully we can learn from the outcomes of all these events on what’s happening. Hopefully Republicans and Democrats come together and they learn from it. We can have a better community.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Definitely. I think one of the issues is you touched on the Republican Democrat. I think that’s one of the problems with the two party system is you have one side blaming the other and of course that side blames the other side right back, and you actually never make progress. I think we need to do is take a step back from looking at it as a Republican Democrat or any other kind of thing, and just accept personal responsibility for ourselves and our communities.

Robert Sanchez: Sure. Absolutely. That’s well said. I think personal responsibility would be big if everybody could just do that I think it would be big and take away the Republican Democrat thing and why we do this and why we do that. And I’m Republican that’s why I do this, if I’m a Democrat why I do that. And I think if we take accountability and responsibility, I think it’ll be a much better place to live in.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Absolutely.

Robert Sanchez: For sure. So just, we’re happy to do in this podcast for sure. We’re lucky to have our co-host and producer Vince Trujillo man, with the graphics and editing, or video and audio, man. He does a great job, but he also does a community segment that we have. You and I we have the law enforcement and fire department lingo that we talk about sometimes the general public don’t even know some of the words that we use but sometimes… And I know Vince says, “Well, what does that even mean?” So it catches me where I’m saying “You know what, the public probably doesn’t even know what it means.” So we try to explain certain words that we use, whatever lingo. And I know just from the community side the community segment, he has great questions that I think the community they want to know. So what’s up Vince man?

Vince Trujillo: Hey how’s it going?

Robert Sanchez: [crosstalk 00:23:56] on with us again.

Vince Trujillo: Thanks for both of you. It was really cool hearing some of that. We had the new show in today, so it was a little distracting and get to hear all this stuff. But you touched on some really good points and first thank you both from the community perspective for your service coming in from law enforcement, great respect coming in from fire service, great respect. I know you guys, don’t like to hear it, but I don’t care from the public side we’re going to say it anyways, because that’s a big, big deal. And especially nowadays, hearing you guys talk about the relationship within the county. And I know that there’s a lot of other places around the country that do things like that and have that interactions. But the respect between you two is goes great to see in a law enforcement, looking at fire service and saying, thank you for everything you guys do.

You guys handle so many calls that people don’t even know about, don’t even see, it doesn’t make any news. It doesn’t do anything and same on law enforcement side, you guys show up to some stuff that is just anywhere from fugly, to not that big of a deal, to stuff that people don’t even understand. So I think it’s really good that people hear that from the community of what’s going on in a relationship between your departments is really a nice thing. So thanks for that part.

Robert Sanchez: Thanks Vince.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Thank you.

Vince Trujillo: So a couple of things that stood out, and I really only caught the last section, which was talking about the stuff going on in the communities right now, and how impactful that is and how tough that is.

I think you answered a lot of the questions well. From the community perspective, so right now everything’s so political too. And we have on the one side, people are thinking like, “Oh, you got like these activists out there doing violent protesting.” And then the other side, you have people like countering that. And then people are like upset that maybe law enforcement has taken a step too far in some segments. And you touched very well on this. It’s like, “Hey, law and order works best when we have community adhering and doing it.”

Well, how should the community interact with law enforcement? Because I have great respect for law enforcement, so many good people there, but if you get people where it’s like they’re putting the community in a dangerous or vulnerable situation where it’s like, “Hey man, maybe I didn’t do that bad of a thing. Maybe I got pulled over by a traffic stop and we had an interaction and next thing I know I’m on the floor with the knee on my neck.” What should the community do to make sure that those kinds of things don’t end in a death, I mean, besides compliance?

Det. Aaron Velarde: Well, the thing is you have those situations, they occur every day and I myself have been stopped by the police. I wasn’t always a cop. I know what it’s like to be that guy driving home late at night and see flashing lights in the rear view mirror, but growing up in a public service family, I was always taught early on whether you agree or not comply. Put your hands up on the steering wheel, turn the dome light on. It definitely sets the officer at ease as he’s making that approach on the vehicle. Those were things I didn’t understand until I became a cop. And then I realized when I saw people doing that, for me, it does put you at ease right off the bat. Obviously you’re not going to let your guard down, but it helps when you can see the interior of the vehicle and it relieves some of that stress as you’re approaching it.

Vince Trujillo: So a lot of it’s really, from your perspective of like, “Hey we deal with stuff everyday.” And I’m going to play devil’s advocate a little bit, but exactly to that point, we saw that the footage of the officer who they leaving the road with on the other side of the mountains, the deputy who was killed.

Det. Aaron Velarde: James [McGrane 00:00:27:13].

Vince Trujillo: Yes. I’m sorry. Say that again.

Det. Aaron Velarde: James McGrane.

Vince Trujillo: Yeah James McGrane and watch that video and it just happens so quickly. And I think that’s the scary thing a lot of people don’t understand about law enforcement. You walk up and it’s not somebody necessarily yelling and screaming, and acting crazy sometimes, and they just pull a gun and that’s it. So for your perspective, it’s like, hey, from the self preservation and to make sure that it’s a safe situation, we want to just know all the factors.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Absolutely. Yeah. The more information we have, the easier it makes it for us, and it reduces that level of stress. So tensions are already high in a situation like that. The last thing you want to do is have something that will escalate it. So if the public complies, whether they agree or not like I explained to Robert earlier, we have a system for that. We have the greatest system in the world to provide justice. Even if you think you didn’t get a fair deal, even in court, you can always appeal it. That’s the beauty of this system is it was designed with so many checks and balances that eventually you will have justice.

Vince Trujillo: Yeah. And it’s just not worth it. In my case there’re times that I’m really upset that I got pulled over for something I didn’t know about like an expired thing or a tail light or something like that. And I’ve been let off too. The Sheriff’s departments being good to me here. I did a lot of things I shouldn’t have been doing in the 90s but in the sheriff departments, that’s all I’m going to say has been good to me here. So I appreciate that.

Robert Sanchez: I don’t even want to know Vince.

Vince Trujillo: That was the 90s of college, that was 20 some years ago. Now let’s take it a step further. So outside of that, and this is something from the community aspect is like, okay, we get that. And I think a lot of people would just help themselves out a little bit more instead of starting to go right to the, “What’d you pull me over for? I don’t have to comply. I don’t have to tell you what I’m doing.” They rolled a window barely down. Now, at what point is it the officer’s responsibility as a law enforcement to see that I have a very un-compliant person. It’s not that big of a stop.

I mean, just so that we know you have to keep pursuing that, just to see if it’s somebody that might have a warrant out or be a more dangerous person. Because we see the videos all the time of somebody, and we don’t know what happened before the video started, but once it started, you see, “Oh, I’m just getting pulled over for a traffic ticket.” Next thing you know, he’s getting into an altercation with the officer, and then there’s two or three people involved. What should we know about our rights? That the officer does have a right to just make sure you’re not as somebody dangerous and outside of that, then you can go about your way.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Right. And that’s one of the questions that we get hit with a lot is how do normal traffic investigations turn that situation where now we’re removing somebody from the vehicle, or we’re involved in an altercation on the side of the highway with somebody that we just pulled over. And a lot of that comes down to people don’t understand the information that we’re dealing with. You don’t know if that officer ran the plate prior to approaching that vehicle and realized that the registered owner has a warrant for homicide.

Obviously the information that you have available to you is going to set the tone for that encounter. So like I said, if you can set them at ease as much as possible, because a lot of times you’ll have people that are that passive, aggressive compliant one minute, not so compliant the next. That also elevates our suspicions. And I think we owe it to not only ourselves with the community to find out what that person’s up to and who they are. I don’t know if I’d be able to live with myself knowing that I could have probably taken a murderer off the street if I would have just been able to ask this guy’s name or run his identification, and find out that he had a warrant.

Vince Trujillo: There’s definitely those things that come up in the news, you hear about it. How did that guy, who was the serial killer get pulled over for something, or the wanted person get pulled over and let go. And that’s just as bad as other things that happen, and do you have anything? I just have one more question.

Okay. So actually the most extreme part, and I think that’s for me is the most concerning is when I do see some things where there’s some police officers or law enforcement that maybe shouldn’t be in that position. And just counter me, please. If I see somebody and I’m like, well Robert’s trained, you’re trained, we’re not trained in the public. We’re just the average Joe. I don’t pretend I could do either of your jobs like this stress and stuff the experience that you guys have in your field is amazing to me.

If in those situations, should the brunt of the responsibility of being the level-headed experienced person be on the law enforcement officer in that situation? Meaning there’s some bad cops. I mean, just because there’s a cross section of people and there’s good and bad people. There’s some people who maybe the stress gets to them a little bit more and there’s other people who handle stress better. Would you say that there’s law enforcement officers that may be the job’s just not cut out for them? Is there mechanisms that can be more identified, so those of us in the public can see things, and be like, “Hey man there is a way to get rid of people maybe who are overly aggressive or just have this history,” because you see it in the, this guy had like 10 complaints of aggressiveness, he had been reprimanded and a lot of things. What is the mechanisms that us in the community can look at and say like, “At least that’s going to get taken care of,” so we’re not worried that someone is just going to be constantly in that, and they shouldn’t be in law enforcement?

Det. Aaron Velarde: Right. And the thing is those mechanisms already exist. They’re already in place. Most agencies have… There’s a hiring process, there’s a screening process. You have to go through psychological tests, physical tests, everything to find out who is most suitable before we even give them the training in the academy for it. But once you’re a cop, there’s also a continual evaluation process of monthly evaluations of what types of use of force you’re using. Everything that we do is documented. Everything that we do is reviewed by someone else. So if you break it down, those mechanisms are already in place. So it’s very rare to see somebody that has a pattern of excessive force or anything like that, continue through an agency and progress through a career, because most of the time, and I can’t speak for all agencies, of course, but most of the time those guys are identified early on through those check systems. And a lot of times they’re identified even by their peers.

That’s one of the things with law enforcement is we also police our own. We’re not going to tolerate somebody abusing the public. I told Robbie earlier that’s part of being in this community is I have family here too. And I wouldn’t want that person abusing one of my family members, or one of my friends or something when nobody’s around. So if we see it, we’re going to call it out, it’s an issue, and it’ll be addressed through those check systems.

Vince Trujillo: Okay. Well, thank you very much. I appreciate your service. Thank you for that. I want to say, just thank you to all law enforcement out there, I appreciate what you’re doing in very difficult times right now. And I think with everything going on, understanding that side that you brought to the table is going to be more helpful to us, and to have patience, have some compassion, and have some understanding with everything that’s going on. Just try to start taking self responsibility and treating ourselves, each other well, too.

Det. Aaron Velarde: Absolutely.

Vince Trujillo: I appreciate that detective. Thank you. Thank you, Robert.

Robert Sanchez: Thank you, man. So Detective Velarde, from Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Department, Aaron, you’re my friend, man. It’s always been a pleasure and thank you for being on the show. Don’t forget to-

Det. Aaron Velarde: Thanks for having me.

Robert Sanchez: No problem, man. Don’t, don’t forget to watch us or listen to us on Apple Podcast, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcast. Also we’re on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram. Thank you for joining us and go ahead Vince.

Vince Trujillo: Yeah. Just one more thing. Please listen to us on Spotify, Podcast, as well as Apple. And we have some really good things coming out this fall we’re going to be doing. We have a Detective Velarde in here. We got some upcoming promotions that we’re going to be doing through the end of the year. We’re going to be helping out first responders. We’re going to show our respect for first responders, handling COVID, having the civil unrest, handling everything that’s going on. We’re going to be given free bags of our Firefighter Kingdom Coffee. It’s going to be a new thing that we have coming out, and also it’s going to be distributed for free.

We’re going to love to interact with you and get some of that distributed to some of your stations, some of your people. It’s just a thank you that we want to send out to the community so that you look for that this fall. If you’re listening to this podcast go to firefighterkingdom.com. We’re going to have our shop on there, where we’re going to be raising money for 10% is going to go to foundations, and also helping out first responders and just saying thank you to the hardships that’s going on right now. I think it’s just a way for us to get that out. So look for that coming up too. Thanks Robert.

Robert Sanchez: Thanks Vince.

The post # 14 – Detective Aaron Velarde | Bernalillo County Sheriff Department appeared first on The FireFighter Kingdom Podcast.

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Sally Cabot Gunning interview by Elise Cooper

Monticello by Sally Cabot Gunning is a fascinating historical novel about the relationship between one of America’s Founding Fathers’ Thomas Jefferson and his eldest daughter Martha. Because the author based this book on actual correspondence between father and daughter it is immersed in reality. Readers see the struggle throughout their life with family, relationships, and issues of the day, including being a good wife, a good mother, honoring her father, and shaping his legacy. His greatest accomplishments included authoring the Declaration of Independence, founder of the University of Virginia, and an advocate for religious freedom as well as an end to slavery. The author explores the complicated life of both father and daughter.

Also a character in the book is Monticello. This home played a significant role in their lives, the family's beloved Virginia plantation among lush mountains. It was a place where Jefferson escaped his political worries and thrived, while Martha sought security, as it became her haven. This soul of the family was also its Achilles heel. It became a necessary evil where they needed to have slaves to manage the plantation. Through Jefferson and his daughter’s life readers will get a glimpse of the complex era.

Elise Cooper: How did you get the idea for the story?

Sally Cabot Gunning: In doing research for my previous book, Benjamin Franklin’s Bastard, I found this letter written by Martha to her father when she was fourteen. It read, ‘I wish with all my soul that the poor Negroes were all freed. It grieves my heart when I think that these, our fellow creatures should be treated so terribly as they are by many of our country men.’ I knew I had to learn more about her and the relationship with her father. As his oldest daughter she was much more involved in Jefferson’s life and with their property at Monticello than I ever could have imagined. I hope readers love this novel as much as I loved writing it.

EC: What research did you do?

SCG: I poured through her letters to her father and his to her and realized that she and I had embarked on a similar mission, to figure out her father. I read all the letters they wrote each other, letters to other people, and numerous biographies. I searched through endless Jefferson documents online. I learned that as Martha matured she came to spend many evenings at her father’s dinner table in the company of Europe’s greatest men of arts, letters, politics, and science, enhancing her education still further. I took many trips to Monticello and discovered something new with each trip, not just about the people who lived there, black and white, but also about the significance Monticello held for them.

EC: How would you describe Martha?

SCG: She looked more like her father and was tall at 5 feet 11 inches. Martha was energetic and feisty. She and her sister were told by their father that they were the most important people in his life. I don’t think she lived in a secure world having lost her mother when she was young, a father who was here, there, and everywhere, and a marriage that was unstable. I think Jefferson might have favored her because why else would he write long letters to his other daughter saying Martha was not the darling of his eyes, almost defending himself.

EC: How did she view her father?

SCG: I read letters where she wrote her father that no one would be more important to her than he. She put her father on a pedestal that no one else could live up to. She always wanted to earn his respect. Her emotional and financial security was her father.

EC: What about her education?

SCG: She was one of the most highly educated women of her time. The point of her education was for her to converse intelligently, teach her children, and to be a good companion. Most women did not receive that type of education, and I think Jefferson saw in her an intellect that should be nurtured. According to what I read she was fascinating to listen to and was a draw, someone cultivated, even by Presidents.

EC: Why did she marry Tom Randolph?

SCG: Her decision to marry Tom Randolph was done impulsively, on the rebound, and turned out to be a bad one. William Short, Thomas Jefferson’s advisor when he was the Minister to France, wanted her to stay but she was persuaded by her father to return to America with him. He was very good at talking people into things. After her return she married someone who wallowed in self-pity. Both Jefferson and she went to great lengths to convince Randolph that he was not in the shadow of her famous father, had equal sway as the other son-in-law, and was beloved. The phrase in the book written by Jefferson is true, ‘I hold you with greater esteem than you hold for yourself.’ Yet, he turned to alcoholism, forcing Martha to take her children and live at Monticello.

EC: When I heard you describe Martha and Thomas Jefferson’s feelings for Monticello I thought of how Scarlett O’Hara felt about Tara from the Gone With The Wind story?

SCG: It definitely was a character in the book. The place itself became so significant in their lives, especially if you think what they did to preserve it. They were hell bent on holding on to it. It was their sanctuary. She actually moved back during her troubled marriage. Also, after Jefferson died, when it was being sold, the family appealed to William Short to influence Martha to not be present.

EC: Monticello was also their Achilles heel?

SCG: It explained many things including slavery, the relationship with each other, and the extreme debt of Jefferson. This is just my observation, but I believe had he not inherited slaves from his father and an enormous debt from his father-in-law he would not have been a slave owner. I also think had he not been in such financial trouble he would have freed his slaves after he died. Although he thought slavery was wrong, it became a necessary evil, a way to manage the plantation.

EC: I think in understanding Jefferson we need to understand the times and not have tunnel vision?

SCG: Yes. A single slave was worth $500. The banks allowed him to keep taking money because he had this ‘valuable commodity.’ Plantation owners were land rich and cash poor. They did not know how to get out from under this vile system. I think that he as a slave owner and his slaves were both victimized by slavery. Many people call him a hypocrite. But until someone learns about the conditions of the day, what was going on, and his beliefs, they should not be making this statement. They need to get the whole paragraph and not the headline.

EC: This book quote shows how both were conflicted over the issue of slavery: “He caused intentional harm to no living creature; that he’d done what he could to ease the plight of those in his care; that he was trapped, as they all were, in a vile system that could not be righted in this life.” Please explain.

SCG: At the beginning of the book I have this quote by Jefferson at the end of his life, ‘on the subject of emancipation I have ceased to think because [it is] not to be a work of my day.’ He did what he could to end it, but was stifled by others and the law. While in France, he had decided to set up tenant farming for those of his slaves who he felt were ready to take on the responsibility. He also believed legislation was needed to do away with slavery in its entirety. In 1769 he had someone file an emancipation bill because he was only a junior legislator. He had an elder respected legislator put it forth, but it was instantly tabled and not put up for a vote. He wrote this into the first draft of the Declaration of Independence, calling slavery ‘a cruel war against human nature itself,’ but others in the Congress had it deleted. He also said, ‘There is no G-d that would side with us in this conflict.’

EC: There is no good slave owner, but with that said how did he treat his slaves?

SCG: He had a paternalistic view of the master/slave relationship with the feeling he needed to care and feed them. He did free five slaves after his death because he knew they could support themselves. He never beat his slaves, and when they went to him with a complaint about the overseers he always sided with the slaves. Remember George Washington gets credit for freeing his slaves, but he did it only after he died when he did not need them anymore. Also, Washington did not free any of the slaves owned by his wife.

EC: Let’s talk about Sally Hemings, the slave Thomas Jefferson had a relationship with. What is your take?

SCG: When she was fourteen she accompanied Jefferson, the American envoy to France, to take care of his youngest daughter Maria. She could have remained free if she stayed in France. She did agree to return to America with Jefferson. I do think she had some agency in it although not total agency. She could have remained free if she stayed in France so she did have some decision making power. Hemings negotiated freedom for her children and privileges: their children would be set free once they reached 21, and Hemings would never again do the work of the other enslaved women at Monticello. An African-American historian who I greatly respect truly believes there was some feeling between the pair. I do not think he physically forced himself upon her; yet, we have to emphasize that if a person owns another person there is the question of mutual consent.

EC: How did Martha feel about the relationship?

SCG: She resented Sally. For example, Sally or Thomas named the child they had together James Madison, and shortly thereafter Martha named her next child by the same name. Martha’s son Jeff stated after she died that his mother had a difficult time with the Sally situation. She made a concerted effort to keep Sally out of her father’s story.

EC: Is your next book going to be about another Founding Father?

SCG: I am leaning to getting back to writing about early 1800s New England.

THANK YOU!

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zoestagg · 7 years

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Ironman Bintan 70.3...

**It took me nearly a month to write this, as I usually focus on the positive around here — but it’s also my scrapbook, and has been for a decade. This is worth having to look back on, and worth voicing as a female experience. The positive? I had a race crew that was willing to get on a plane for eight hours, schlep a bike internationally, and hang around waiting to cheer me on all day. They’re why while the race experience itself might have scarred me, the DNF didn’t embarrass me at all. How could it? There was still a bottle of champagne waiting at the hotel and a week left to float in the pool and explore. That’s the amazing part. Now…the rest.**

I felt rushed. I worked in the dark in my eight square inches of space to arrange my transition spot. I hadn’t eaten yet, I hadn’t found the porta-potties, and I hadn’t done one single open-water swim the entire training cycle.

That sounds like a race-anxiety nightmare, and that was only the first five minutes.

It was about to get way, way worse.

I’ve given up getting mad that they issue the women’s wave neon pink caps. It’s hack, but fine. Frankie is delighted when they get passed down to her immediately after. In the dozen of waves that waited in the corral for their chance to swim, there was only one of women.

The Pros and younger men’s age groups started off, and I tried not to throw up as I waited in the practice area, dipping my head in the water to make sure my goggles were good. It was as promised, blessedly smooth. Nothing like the squalling Mediterranean three years ago. And even though I hadn’t had the opportunity to swim outside of a pool, this was honestly as pool-like as it was going to get. The squared-off course was pretty straight forward.

All I had to do was get around it.

The green caps launched off, and the blue caps filed in. If you’ve never been to the start of a big corporate race, it’s not for the sound-sensitive. It’s loud. Constant announcements on a sort of endless yammer, music, repeat. At the start, there’s a sort of DJ/Emcee scenario. He was working the crowd, asking people where they’re from.

“Australia!” “All right then, mate!”

“USA!” “Right. Back of the line then.”

You guys. The world really isn’t pleased.

The horn blew and the blue caps splashed in, making room for the women. The pump-up music for the women’s wave started. I would say it was a really annoying one-off if it wasn’t played at every daggone race I’ve done.

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun.

Now excuse me while I REALLY try not to barf. You’re right, I spent two hours of every day, plus most of every weekend training to have FUN. You’re SECONDARILY RIGHT that no inspiring song about the female condition has been recorded since 1982. This would make me mad enough to swear right here if this was the extent of the grief I would be given for my gender that day, but it WASN’T AT ALL so stay flipping tuned.

I’m apparently still very, very mad.

When I did the Olympic distance ocean swim in my first race, I was so scared I wasn’t going to make the time cutoff. This go around, after I kind of jockeyed for space in my preferred spot, (back of the wave and as close to the line as possible) I got kind of calm. It wasn’t so bad. I just started swimming — PROPERLY, even. This is a big deal. Last ocean swim it was too choppy for me to put my head in. Sometimes in lakes there’s too much…nature to make it possible to crawl for long without wanting to scream the whole lake in. This time, eh. It was water.

IT WAS JUST WATER. And I swam.

I didn’t even panic much, when I heard them release the wave behind me. That didn’t stop me from being the girl who was yelling “NO TOUCHIES NO TOUCHIES” as my mantra when they got too close to my tail fins. Look. It’s the terrifying ocean with WILDLIFE, if you want to pass, just go around.

NO TOUCHIES.

I was feeling weirdly good. I don’t even remember the swim being much effort. It looked like I could have just stood up the whole time, which helped too. I think I checked my watch once at the half, and then not again until I could hear the music again at the swim out. 48:00. I had 70:00 minutes before I blew the deadline, I was fiiiiiine.

I swam as far in as I could, got out and pumped some fists that I didn’t have to try to peel off a wetsuit, and heard the *beep beep* as I crossed the timing mat. (Swim Time: 1900m/54:00)

This race, given that we had to schlep a bike and suitcase and everything on multiple planes and a ferry, meant that I didn’t bring a bunch of stuff I might have otherwise. Stuff, like oh, the race fuel I’m used to. I couldn’t really bring onigiri that far in advance, I couldn’t really pack a jar of peanut butter and tortillas, I just… Improvised. I’d downed a couple of handfuls of trail mix before the swim, and now before the bike, I crammed in bites of protein cookie washed down with water like a competitive eater. I pulled on my fanny pack with more snacks, pulled up my bib belt, and yanked my bike off the rack. I was feeling cautiously optimistic and ready to ride. (Transition 1: 6:30)

I didn’t know as I pedaled out, that it would be about 45 minutes until everything turned to garbage.

Indonesia is lush. There are legit monkeys just chilling on the side of the road like wild cats. I pumped my legs and tried to occupy my thoughts and take in the scenery. It’s in those moments, that a couple of things can happen: you can look down at your speedometer and be pleasantly surprised that you’re pulling 20 mph without really trying; and you can discover that the theme song to The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air is the exact beat that makes that cadence.

I had read the race description. Something about “a few gentle rolling hills.” I had watched the time-lapse video of the whole bike course. Looked pretty flat to me!

IT WAS NOT FLAT.

The first hill hit, and preceded three hours of switching back and forth between 4 mph as I stood up and pumped in the lowest gear, and 24 mph as I tried to make it back. I struggle a little with my feet on the bike, I have to remind myself to stay off of them and wiggle my toes and watch my form so I don’t end up with knives stabbing through the balls. This amount of standing up? There’s no terrain around here that I could have used to prepare for that. But whatever. We finished a loop out of a forested road, and hit a town. There were Indonesian flags everywhere, most buildings and houses had one planted. I don’t know how much of that is set-dressing for the race, but the KIDS.

The kids, were not.

They stood outside of houses and tiny village storefronts watching and cheering. This parade of 2,000 insane people on bicycles was the most exciting Sunday morning show, and they cheered everyone who passed. I made it my mission to be a one-woman good-sport committee and gave every single group a “Good morning!!!! Hiiiii!” Some of them yelled back, “Winner!” and it was pretty outstanding. Eventually, the tiny villages in the trees thinned out, revealing violent red clay hillscapes, and the sun started to really beat.

From the course preview video -- even watching again, I don’t know how they managed to make the hills disappear, but they did. And that bridge? The “guard rail” was just the two pipes and then a 50-foot drop. Not cozy.

By the bridge, enough time had passed to thin the herd, and I suddenly found myself in Indonesia, about 25 miles from anyone I knew, and as race rules dictate (YOU WILL BE GIVEN A RED CARD DQ IF YOU ARE CAUGHT USING A PHONE OR ELECTRONIC DEVICE) without a phone.

Fun.

I pumped on, and tried to stay positive. The course wasn’t closed, it was on roads shared as the rest of the island’s life went on, and as I started to think about pulling off to stand up for a second and swap my water bottles around, a scooter passed. The man driving it slowed as he passed me and took a hard look. I watched, because as much as Japan doesn’t require you to have street smarts, I’ve lived places, okay. He continued up the road a hundred yards and turned around, riding past again.

I didn’t stop.

Another scooter revved up from behind me. This one had friends. He pulled ahead of me, while one pulled beside and another, stayed behind. They were teenagers, and started talking to me, motioning me to pull over.

“No. I’m fine. I’m riding. No.”

Sometime after the water stop that told me they were out of water after I had already dumped my hot water out to switch, a truck rolled by. The man leaned out the window and said,

“I love you.”

I don’t think he meant that in a positive and nurturing way that respects my agency as a human being.

All I wanted was to stop and spend 45 seconds getting my fuel situated. The second my speed dipped, there would be a scooter or two, appearing out of nowhere, making very sure I wasn’t going to stop for all of the Gatorade in China. About the time the man drove by making kissy noises, and I’d spent a good three hours calculating how long it would take me to get stuffed in the back of a truck on a course where the only chip mats are at 20k and 70k and it would be a really long time before anyone missed me, I started to sob hysterically.

(Let’s take a moment of brightness to know that as awful of a time I was having, Ryan and Frankie were okay waiting for me. Phew.)

Now. There were medic vans and mechanic vans on the course, I did see them periodically. But by the time I was rolling through 40 miles, I was in such a state from dealing with harassment from almost every vehicle that passed, I started to really lose it.

“DON’T TALK TO ME. DON’T LOOK AT ME. LEAVE ME ALONE.”

It’s kind of hard to ride your bike when you’re scream crying.

Eventually, I rolled though 52 miles, and another biker spun up past me. “There’s 30 minutes to cutoff! Keep going, you’ll make it.” At this point, I really didn’t even care. I was sobbing, and worried I wouldn’t be able to stop if Frankie was at the transition point. I think I rode past Ryan and Frankie at the end of the bike, and was completely relieved I wouldn’t have to talk to them right then. (Bike 56 miles/4:39:12)

This smile is fake.

I racked my bike, probably still yelling “BAN MEN,” and sat down at transition and really cried. I cried because I was slow enough that I’d been an easy target. I cried that 75% of the competitors probably had a LOVELY time on the course and in the world in general and would never know how awful it feels to be prey, and I cried because what a burden that is, what an unequal athletic playing field that is and BAN MEN.

And then I put on my running shoes and tried to find the run out. No signs. Who cares at this point, right? (Transition 2: 6:23)

I started to run. I was scared I was going to have to go out and subject myself to more unwanted attention, but the run course was protected, in some kind of weird golf course or something. The sun dipped behind clouds and I set the first goal to getting to where I thought the spectators might be. I was still entirely on edge, and when I heard a male voice behind me, I whipped around with a LOOK. He paused.

“I don’t mean to be rude, but um, is this your first lap or your second?”

I relaxed, a little. “First. THOSE HILLS.”

“I know! Okay, thanks! Have a good run.”

He jogged on, and I felt the first drop. And then the second. And then, dear reader, I found out what an Indonesian monsoon feels like. For the next hour, the skies opened.

The surface of the lake was a blur as raindrops bounced six inches off the surface. The trail filled with water, and then flooded. Eventually, it was ankle deep. My shoes started to rub blisters. I couldn’t see in front of me. Aid stations ducked under tarps as the wind whipped.

And I knew it was over.

I passed the halfway on the run, and a restaurant. Ryan and Frankie, who I was totally worried about in all of the rain, were tucked inside having lunch. I stood outside dripping, gave Ryan the short version of the awful day, and said I was checking out. I could have propelled myself the last 10k without the wet blisters. Without a time cutoff, I could have technically finished. As I neared the lap switch, the guy in charge said,

“You’ve missed it.” (Time spent running: 1:44:28)

vimeo

You know what happens when you don’t make the last time cutoff in a monsoon? They withhold the giveaway towels because they say “Finisher” on them.

It’s fine.

I stood in the middle of the flooded field while those who’d had a much better day got their medals, and filed a report. Who knows if anyone got it, but now there’s a handy link to send to HQ, right? Ultimately, this race location is not suited for female athletes. I was wearing the same thing as everyone else. I’m OLD. I was still harassed for five hours. And I DNFed, my first one ever.

And I’ve signed up for another one in December.

#ironman #triathlon #try club #swimming #running #bicycles #indonesia #bintan

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networkingdefinition · 5 years

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Massachusetts State Quotes

Official Website: Massachusetts State Quotes

• And a special thank you to the citizens of Massachusetts: You are paying all the taxes, creating all the jobs, raising all the children. This government is yours. Thank you for letting me serve you. I love this job. – Mitt Romney • And I agree that the Democratic legislators in Massachusetts might have given some advice to Republicans in Congress about how to cooperate, but the fact of the matter is we used the same advisers and they say it’s the same plan. – Barack Obama • And of course coming from Massachusetts, Rocky Marciano was my favorite. – Robert Goulet • And some sad news… the first lesbian couple to legally get married in the state of Massachusetts has split up. They cited irreconcilable similarities. – Jay Leno • As an economics undergraduate, I also worked on a part-time basis in Cambridge, Massachusetts, for a company that was advising customers about portfolio decisions, writing reports. – Merton Miller

jQuery(document).ready(function($) var data = action: 'polyxgo_products_search', type: 'Product', keywords: 'Massachusett', orderby: 'rand', order: 'DESC', template: '1', limit: '68', columns: '4', viewall:'Shop All', ; jQuery.post(spyr_params.ajaxurl,data, function(response) var obj = jQuery.parseJSON(response); jQuery('#thelovesof_massachusett').html(obj); jQuery('#thelovesof_massachusett img.swiper-lazy:not(.swiper-lazy-loaded)' ).each(function () var img = jQuery(this); img.attr("src",img.data('src')); img.addClass( 'swiper-lazy-loaded' ); img.removeAttr('data-src'); ); ); ); • Basketball may have been invented in Massachusetts, but it was made for Indiana. – Bobby Knight • Because of my own family’s service (in the U.S. Army, Navy, and Massachusetts and New York National Guard), I am a strong supporter of the military and do believe that there are just wars. – Camille Paglia • Both my parents came from Russia and suddenly they wound up in Boston, Massachusetts, Brookline, Massachusetts and they felt the sun rose and set on Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s backside because he meant so much to them. This was freedom. This was something totally different from the Russia they had left. – Mike Wallace • By the time I started high school, I knew I wanted to be a writer. After graduating from Smith College in Massachusetts, I moved to New York City and worked for the advertising agency J. Walter Thompson. – Cynthia Voigt • By the way, if I have my own cult of personality with my own geodetic dome in western Massachusetts, I will have a hurt yurt for anyone who crosses me. – John Hodgman • Courage–judgment–integrity–dedication–these are the historic qualities of the Bay Colony and the Bay State….And these are the qualities which, with God’s help, this son of Massachusetts hopes will characterize our government’s conduct in the four stormy years that lie ahead. – John F. Kennedy • Deadly assault weapons have no place in Massachusetts. – Mitt Romney • Even in Madison’s day, the practice of gerrymandering for partisan advantage was familiar. In the late seventeen-eighties, there were claims that Patrick Henry had tried to gerrymander Madison himself out of the First Congress. The term was coined during Madison’s Presidency, to mock Elbridge Gerry, the governor of Massachusetts, who in 1811 approved an election district that was said to look like a salamander. – Jeffrey Toobin • For me when I was growing up, some of the happiest times were when we went to a small island called Nantucket off Massachusetts. – Gwyneth Paltrow • Foreign diplomats could have modeled their conduct on the way the Negro postmen, Pullman porters, and dining car waiters of Roxbury [Massachusetts] acted, striding around as if they were wearing top hats and cutaways. – Malcolm X • From tea parties to the election in Massachusetts, we are witnessing the single greatest political pushback in American history. – Marco Rubio • Governor Romney has been a great success in business. He has been a great success as executive, as governor of Massachusetts. I think that’s the kind of guy we want in the White House. – Chris Christie • Henry Adams was scared shitless, politically, by the discovery that England isn’t alien to a boy from Boston, but it was true, and it is true. It’s a Boston and coastal Massachusetts thing. Henry Adams blocked it out. – William Monahan • I am told that there have been over the years a number of experiments taking place in places like Massachusetts Institute of Technology that have been entirely based on concepts raised by Star Trek. – Patrick Stewart • I can tell you, Massachusetts, fastest growing sector of our economy is clean energy and energy efficiency companies. And they’re growing faster than any other sector. – John F. Kerry • I can work in London. A British journalist asked me if I had any trouble working with an English crew, as an American, and I said I might have if I was from Scotland, but I’m from Massachusetts, which is sort of Oxfordshire, but more intellectual. That’s kind of unforgivable but you’ve got to let them have it. – William Monahan • I can’t imagine having a conversation about ‘Celebrity Big Brother’ in Cambridge, Massachusetts. – Niall Ferguson • I come to present the strong claims of suffering humanity. I come to place before the Legislature of Massachusetts the condition of the miserable, the desolate, the outcast. I come as the advocate of helpless, forgotten, insane men and women; of beings sunk to a condition from which the unconcerned world would start with real horror. – Dorothea Dix • I did one of the worst shows for that kind of thing in Northampton, Massachusetts, which is one of the most liberal spots on the planet. There were numerous people who walked out, somebody had thrown a beer, I had people yelling and screaming. – David Cross • I do not hesitate to say, that those who call themselves Abolitionists should at once effectually withdraw their support, both inperson and property, from the government of Massachusetts, and not wait until they constitute a majority of one, before they suffer the right to prevail through them. I think that it is enough if they have God on their side, without waiting for that other one. Moreover, any man more right than his neighbors constitutes a majority of one already. – Henry David Thoreau • I do not wish, it happens, to be associated with Massachusetts, either in holding slaves or in conquering Mexico. I am a little better than herself in these respects. – Henry David Thoreau • I don’t know if I ever mentioned back in 2002 we fought our way into a governor’s debate in Massachusetts where, you know, this was televised and I articulated our usual agenda: cut the military, put the dollars into true security here at home, provide healthcare as a human right, raise wages which needed to be living wages, green our energy system, equal marriage? – we were the only ones talking about it back in 2002. – Jill Stein • I grew up in a town called Hopedale, Massachusetts. I was born there in 1964, and the only thing I hate outside of myself is everything else. – Dana Gould • I grew up in Fall River, Massachusetts. My background was modest, and I worked at a Portuguese bakery in town. – Emeril Lagasse • I had a teacher’s degree and a degree in Oriental Philosophy from the University of Massachusetts. I thought I was going to India to study but all of a sudden, I had a career in music. It really surprised me. – Buffy Sainte-Marie • I know this well, that if one thousand, if one hundred, if ten men whom I could name,–if ten honest men only,–ay, if one HONESTman, in this State of Massachusetts, ceasing to hold slaves, were actually to withdraw from this copartnership, and be locked up in the county jail therefor, it would be the abolition of slavery in America. For it matters not how small the beginning may seem to be: what is once well done is done forever. – Henry David Thoreau • I noted, though, that other strong critics of Donald Trump did attend the inauguration. Hillary Clinton went. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders went. I saw Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren. I saw Congressman James Clyburn, all of whom have been critics of Donald Trump. – Michel Martin • I shall enter on no encomium upon Massachusetts; she needs none. There she is. Behold her, and judge for yourselves. There is her history; the world knows it by heart. The past, at least, is secure. There is Boston and Concord and Lexington and Bunker Hill; and there they will remain forever. – Daniel Webster • I think [John Adams’s] influence on the federal Constitution was indirect. Many including James Madison mocked the first volume of Adams’s Defence of the Constitutions of the United States in 1787. But his Massachusetts constitution was a model for those who thought about stable popular governments, with its separation of powers, its bicameral legislature, its independent judiciary, and its strong executive. – Gordon S. Wood • I think it’s alright if the government wants to say, in the state of Massachusetts, in the state of New York, in the state of California, that civil ceremonies should be accepted, I think that should be fine. I don’t think that even those states that believe in civil marriages between homosexuals or ordained in a church should perform civil ceremonies. – Jimmy Carter • I think it’s unconscionable for a Senator from Massachusetts to come down here and tell the people of Florida what’s right for them. It’s arrogant and irresponsible. – Jeff Miller • I think that Governor Romney needs to talk about the fact that what he tried to do in the state of Massachusetts was him seeing what could be best for his state, but maybe it didn’t work out as well. – Allen West • I took part in a theatre festival in Massachusetts two summers after I graduated from college. Then I was in Los Angeles thinking: “I’m going to go to New York.” I’d decided that I would not have a chance of a film career, so I was about to make the move. I bought a plane ticket and found a place to live in New York, packed my bags and of course the universe “told me” that I was not meant to go. Suddenly, a week before I was supposed to leave, I had three job offers and one of them was my first movie. – Chris Pine • I took the T from Logan airport to Harvard Square. I hate driving in Boston. It’s the traffic that drives me spare, and the absolutely terrible manners of the motorists. Other New Englanders refer to Massachusetts drivers as “Massholes. – Geraldine Brooks • I used to live in New York City, then when my son was two years old we moved to Cambridge Massachusetts and we’ve been there ever since. My son is now twenty-nine years old, so we’ve been up there for a while. – Errol Morris • I was an actor as a kid in Boston. Then I went to art school with Brice Marden, the Massachusetts College of Art. So the hybrid of being an actor and artist is a director. – Arne Glimcher • I was born in Massachusetts and lived there until I was thirteen years old. – Robert Goulet • I was born in Taunton, Massachusetts on June 1, 1917, but I actually grew up in nearby New Bedford. – William Standish Knowles • I was born on a tiny cot in southwestern Massachusetts during World War II. A sickly child, I turned to photography to overcome my loneliness and isolation. – William Wegman • I was listening to music to kind of pump myself up and get psyched up, like I was listening to Iron Maiden and Misfits and Dead Kennedys, and it was like my ’80s Massachusetts parking-lot heavy metal and Guns N’ Roses. – Eli Roth • I went to high school in Lexington, Massachusetts, which in hindsight was very nice. – Eugene Mirman • I went to Massachusetts to make a difference. I didn’t go there to begin a political career running time and time again. I made a difference. I put in place the things I wanted to do. – Mitt Romney • I won the youth vote in Massachusetts and in California. I did very well with it in Ohio. – Hillary Clinton • If I lived in Massachusetts, I’d try to vote ten times … Yeah that’s right, I’d cheat to keep these bastards out. I would. Because that’s exactly what they are. – Ed Schultz • I’m a big believer in getting money from where the money is, and the money is in Washington. I learned from running the Olympics that you can get money there to help build economic opportunities. We actually got over $410 million from the federal government; that is a huge increase over anything ever done before. We did that by going after every agency of government. That kind of creativity I want to bring to everything we do (in Massachusetts). – Mitt Romney • I’m extremely proud of my family’s record of public service to Massachusetts and the nation. – Joseph P. Kennedy III • I’m from Boston, and in Boston, you are born with a baseball bat in your hand. And actually, most of the bats in Massachusetts are used off the field instead of on the field, and we all had baseball bats in our cars in high school. – Eli Roth • I’m from Connecticut, and we don’t have any dialects. Well, I don’t think we have any dialects, and yeah, it’s very complex. That Rhode Island/Massachusetts New England region is arguably the hardest dialect to nail. – Seth MacFarlane • I’m lucky to have been raised in the most beautiful place – Amherst, Massachusetts, state of my heart. I’m more patriotic to Massachusetts than to almost any place. – Uma Thurman • I’m with an old family” was the euphemism used to dignify the professions of white folks’ cooks and maids who talked so affectedly among their own kind in Roxbury [Massachusetts] that you couldn’t even understand them. – Malcolm X • In 1948 I entered the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, undecided between studies of chemistry and physics, but my first year convinced me that physics was more interesting to me. – Burton Richter • In Massachusetts they [Democratic politicians] steal, in California they feud, and in New York they lie. – Robert Kennedy • In Massachusetts, scientists have created the first human clone. The bad thing is that in thirty years, the clone will still be depressed because the Boston Red Sox will still have not won a World Series. – Craig Kilborn • In Massachusetts, where properly qualified ‘persons’ were allowed to practice law, the Supreme Court decided that a woman was not a ‘person,’ and a special act of the legislature had to be passed before Miss Lelia Robinson could be admitted to the bar. But today women are lawyers. – Lucy Stone • In Montana, they renamed a town after an all-time great, Joe Montana. Well, a town in Massachusetts changed their name to honor my guy Terry Bradshaw–Marblehead. – Howie Long • In the little town where I live in Hampshire County, Massachusetts, we now have a ‘Public Safety Complex’ around the corner from what used to be our hokey Andy Griffith-esque fire station. – Rachel Maddow • In the very next election, the American people elected 63 new Republicans to the House of Representatives – the largest sweep of Congress for any party since 1948. Even liberal Massachusetts elected a Republican senator solely because of his vow to vote against Obamacare. – Ann Coulter • Indeed, if I understand this global-warming business correctly, the danger is that the waters will rise and drown the whole of Massachusetts, New York City, Long Island, the California coast and a few big cities on the Great Lakes – in other words, every Democratic enclave will be wiped out leaving only the solid Republican heartland. Politically speaking, for conservatives there’s no downside to global warming. – Mark Steyn • It is the night-black Massachusetts legendry which packs the really macabre “kick”. Here is material for a really profound study in group-neuroticism; for certainly, no one can deny the existence of a profoundly morbid streak in the Puritan imagination. – H. P. Lovecraft • It is time to acknowledge the extraordinary sacrifice of all of our veterans. While many Massachusetts soldiers served our nation in a period technically dubbed ‘peacetime,’ they restored American pride in the wake of Vietnam and helped bring a successful end to the Cold War. The service of these men and women was not without cost. There are countless stories of soldiers who served with great distinction only to be denied veteran status after returning home. Every man and woman who volunteered to serve this country should be treated with the same degree of respect, gratitude and dignity. – Mitt Romney • It was [John’s Adams] Massachusetts constitution if anything that influenced people. – Gordon S. Wood • John Kerry’s victory over Howard Dean has completely changed the presidential race around. Now instead of the rich white guy from Yale who lives in the White house facing off against the rich white guy from Yale who lives in Vermont, he may have to face the rich white guy from Yale who lives in Massachusetts. It’s a whole different game. – Jay Leno • Just a small-scale cult of personality, maybe raise a geodetic dome out in western Massachusetts and make people wear jumpsuits and give all their possessions to me. – John Hodgman • Let me announce this to the American people tonight one of the best things about this debate, as a Democrat from Massachusetts, I have proposed eliminating, getting rid of the alternative minimum tax. – Richard Neal • Let me tell you the story about Massachusetts under Governor Romney. It did fall to 47th out of 50 in jobs creation. Wages went down when they were going up in the rest of the country. He left his successor with debt and a deficit, and manufacturing jobs left that state at twice the rate as the rest of the country. – Stephanie Cutter • Massachusetts became the first state to marry gay couples, though lawmakers say allowing gay couples to get married raises a lot of questions. You know, such as: does that best man invite both guys to the bachelor party? – Jay Leno • Massachusetts children cannot only lead the nation in test scores, they can be competitive with the best in the world. And the gap in achievement among races can virtually disappear. – Mitt Romney • Massachusetts constitution] was [John Adams] attempt to justify that structure by the traditional notion of social estates – that the executive represented the monarchical estate, the senate the aristocratic estate, and the house of representatives the estate of the people. – Gordon S. Wood • Massachusetts is the first state in America to reach full adulthood. The rest of America is still in adolescence. – Uwe Reinhardt • Massachusetts led the nation passing the first state minimum wage a century ago in June 1912, and with passage of an $11 state minimum wage … will be leading the nation again with a wage floor that is good for business, good for customers and good for our economy. – Holly Sklar • Massachusetts women as a rule adhere too strongly to old-time conventions. – Julia Ward Howe • Matt and I have set a date. Matt and I will tie the knot New Years Day in the town of Swampscott, Massachusetts. Reserve your hotel rooms now. I will be having a gay marriage. – Ben Affleck • Mitt Romney is a] Massachusetts moderate who, in fact, is pretty good at managing the decay.” He’s “given no evidence in his years in Massachusetts of any ability to change the culture or change the political structure. – Newt Gingrich • Mitt Romney talks a lot about all the things he’s fixed. I can tell you that Massachusetts wasn’t one of them. He’s a fine fellow and a great salesman, but as governor he was more interested in having the job than doing it. – Deval Patrick • Mr. President, I wish to speak today, not as a Massachusetts man, nor as a Northern man, but as an American. I speak for the preservation of the Union. Hear me for my cause. – Daniel Webster • My daughter just graduated college and she’s a dance major. She’s done a couple of dance videos already and won Miss Massachusetts a couple of weeks ago. She’s going out for Miss United States the second week of July, out in Las Vegas. She will probably wind up going to New York and trying the Broadway thing. – Doug Flutie • My father was in the coal business in West Virginia. Both dad and mother were, however, originally from Massachusetts; New England, to them, meant the place to go if you really wanted an education. – John Knowles • My grandfather on my mother’s side was a professor of mechanical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; my other grandfather was a lawyer, and one time Speaker of the Tennessee House of Representatives. – Kenneth G. Wilson • My intention was to enroll at McGill University but an unexpected series of events led me to study physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. – Sidney Altman • My mother was independent. She had grown up in Dalton and Pittsfield, in western Massachusetts, and she was one of the first women drivers in that area. – Julia Child • My next book is on the Salem witch trials. As a small-town Massachusetts girl, this makes me very happy. So does the reunion with documents! – Stacy Schiff • My understanding is that Kansas, Massachusetts, they’ve been more pioneers on the special education side. – Margaret Spellings • New Jersey boasts the highest percentage of passport holders (68%); Delaware (67%), Alaska (65%), Massachusetts (63%), New York (62%), and California (60%) are close behind. At the opposite end of the spectrum, less than one in five residents of Mississippi are passport holders, and just one in four residents of West Virginia, Kentucky, Alabama, and Arkansas. – Richard Florida • No: until I want the protection of Massachusetts to be extended to me in some distant Southern port, where my liberty is endangered, or until I am bent solely on building up an estate at home by peaceful enterprise, I can afford to refuse allegiance to Massachusetts, and her right to my property and life. It costs me less in every sense to incur the penalty of disobedience to the State than it would to obey. I should feel as if I were worth less in that case. – Henry David Thoreau • Now I have been studying very closely what happens every day in the courts in Boston, Massachusetts. You would be astounded–maybe you wouldn’t, maybe you have been around, maybe you have lived, maybe you have thought, maybe you have been hit–at how the daily rounds of injustice make their way through this marvelous thing that we call “due process. – Howard Zinn • Obviously, the technology community in Massachusetts competes in a global economy, and our efforts to create a more competitive environment recognizes that competitiveness at a local level. We’d expect employers in other states to use this site as they consider where in Massachusetts to locate or expand their presence. – Christopher Anderson • Of the creative spirits that flourished in Concord, Massachusetts, it might be said that Hawthorne loved men but felt estranged from them, Emerson loved ideas even more than men, and Thoreau loved himself. – Leon Edel • On the 31st of August, 1846, I left Concord in Massachusetts for Bangor and the backwoods of Maine,… I proposed to make excursions to Mount Ktaadn, the second highest mountain in New England, about thirty miles distant, and to some of the lakes of the Penobscot, either alone or with such company as I might pick up there. – Henry David Thoreau • One night last summer, all the killers in my head assembled on a stage in Massachusetts to sing show tunes. – Sarah Vowell • Only a liberal senator from Massachusetts would say that a 49 percent increase in funding for education was not enough. – George W. Bush • Our nation is too different, too diverse to say that what works in Massachusetts is somehow going to be grabbed by the federal government, usurping the power of states and imposing a one-size-fits-all plan on the nation. That will not work. – Mitt Romney • Pennsylvania, the state that has produced two great men: Benjamin Franklin of Massachusetts, and Albert Gallatin of Switzerland. – John James Ingalls • Perhaps more significant than his experience in Europe, though, was [John] Adams’s experience in his own country, and his extensive reading on the history of the English constitution. In 1779, he had an opportunity to try out his ideas by framing the Massachusetts constitution. – Gordon S. Wood • PILGRIM, n. A traveler that is taken seriously. A Pilgrim Father was one who [was] not permitted to sing psalms through his nose [in Europe], followed it to Massachusetts, where he could personate God according to the dictates of his conscience. – Ambrose Bierce • Reforming the way the state works with businesses and providing incentives for employers will help preserve and create new jobs in Massachusetts. – Mitt Romney • Remember, we could solve this in a heartbeat with ranked-choice voting. The Democrats won’t pass it. This allows you to rank your choices and eliminates the intimidation and the fear. They won’t pass it; I know because I helped file the bill. Sixteen years ago in Massachusetts they could have solved the spoiler problem. They won’t do it because they rely on fear. The fact that they rely on fear tells you something very important. They are not on your side. For that reason alone, they do not deserve your vote. – Jill Stein • Republican Scott Brown lost his bid for Senate in New Hampshire last night, two years after he was voted out as Senator in Massachusetts. When asked what he was planning to do next, he said, ‘Are they still looking for a mayor in Toronto?’ – Jimmy Fallon • Roadrunner, roadrunner, going faster miles an hour. Gonna drive past the Stop ‘n’ Shop, with the radio on. I’m in love with Massachusetts and the neon when it’s cold outside. And the highway when it’s late at night. Got the radio on, I’m like the roadrunner. – Jonathan Richman • Scott Brown may be the last Republican to win a statewide fight in Massachusetts for a very long time. He caught the machine flat-footed in January 2010 when he out-hustled Martha Coakley and stole the Senate seat Ted Kennedy held all those years. And since then, the Democrats haven’t lost a single statewide fight. – Howie Carr • Scott Brown’s victory in Massachusetts has got to have Ted Kennedy rolling over in his grave, spilling his drink. – Ann Coulter • Sodomy will always be a sin with god, even if its legal in Massachusetts. – Gordon Klingenschmitt • The American servicemen and women of the Guard and Reserve leave their jobs, their spouses and their children to wear the uniform that defends our country. This selfless commitment should be honored by businesses across Massachusetts as we work to ensure they are treated fairly while they balance their employment responsibilities and obligations to the armed services. No business should ever put the bottom line ahead of America’s front line. – Mitt Romney • The available divorce data show that marital breakdown is now considerably more common in the Bible Belt than in the secular Northeast. . . . The percentages of broken families and unwed mothers remained higher in places like Arkansas and Oklahoma than in New York and Massachusetts. – Joe Conason • The average parent may, for example, plant an artist or fertilize a ballet dancer and end up with a certified public accountant. We cannot train children along chicken wire to make them grow in the right direction. Tying them to stakes is frowned upon, even in Massachusetts. – Ellen Goodman • The fact is I’ve been in Massachusetts for the last two weeks, and it seems over the last few days that the price is increasing by the hour at the pump, so there needs to be an aggressive investigation. – Marty Meehan • The first newspaper I worked on was the ‘Springfield Union’ in Springfield, Massachusetts. I wrote over a hundred letters to newspapers asking for work and got three responses, two no’s. – Tom Wolfe • The first time I ran for office in 2002, running for governor in Massachusetts against Mitt Romney, we actually worked with a Democratic legislator to file that bill, so that there would be no risk of splitting the vote. The Democrats had about 85% of the Legislature at that time. They could have easily protected their access to the governorship. But they refused to do so. They wouldn’t let the bill out of committee. – Jill Stein • The irony is that we’ve seen this model work really well in Massachusetts because Gov. Romney did a good thing, working with Democrats in the state to set up what is essentially the identical model and, as a consequence, people are covered there. It hasn’t destroyed jobs. And as a consequence, we now have a system in which we have the opportunity to start bringing down costs as opposed to just leaving millions of people out in the cold.” “Gov. Romney said this has to be done on a bipartisan basis – Barack Obama • The late rebellion in Massachusetts has given more alarm than I think it should have done. Calculate that one rebellion in thirteen states in the course of eleven years, is but one for each state in a century and a half. No country should be so long without one. Nor will any degree of power in the hands of government prevent insurrections. – Thomas Jefferson • The Massachusetts constitution was written much later than the other revolutionary state constitutions, and thus it avoids some of the earlier mistakes. The executive is stronger, with a limited veto; the senate is more formidable; and the judiciary is independent. – Gordon S. Wood • The Massachusetts constitution] resembles the federal Constitution of 1787 more closely than any of the other revolutionary state constitutions. It was also drawn up by a special convention, and it provided for popular ratification – practices that were followed by the drafters of the federal Constitution of 1787 and subsequent state constitution-makers. – Gordon S. Wood • The Massachusetts Institute of Technology accepts blacks in the top ten percent of students, but at MIT this puts them in the bottom ten percent of the class. – Thomas Sowell • The Massachusetts Land Bank, during Colonial times, prospered, and brought prosperity to the community, until it was forcibly suppressed by special act of Parliament. – John Buchanan Robinson • The old charters of Massachusetts, Virginia, and the Carolinas had given title to strips of territory extending from the Atlantic westward to the Pacific. – Albert Bushnell Hart • The old rule in Massachusetts politics is shape of the field determines the winner. If you have got a whole bunch of hawks, all the way from [Mike] Huckabee all the way across to [Chris]Christie, that covers the spectrum on every other issue, all hawks, all hawks, and one guy out there saying, not me, Jimmy Carter won that way back in `76. I know it`s 1,000 years ago. – Chris Matthews • the place (Dogtown, in Gloucester, Massachusetts, fh) is forsaken and majestically lovely as if nature had at last formed one spot where she can live for herself alone.. (it) looked like a cross between Easter Island and Stonehenge – essentially druidic in it appearance, it gives the feeling that an ancient race might turn up at any moment and renew an ageless rite there. – Marsden Hartley • The Senator from Massachusetts has given us ample grounds to doubt the judgment and the attitude he brings to bear on vital issues of national security. – Dick Cheney • The Turkish Embassy in Washington is an ornate, eclectic building on the corner of Twenty-third Street and Massachusetts Avenue which was built originally for Edward Hamlin Everett, the man who put the crimp in bottle caps. – George W. S. Trow • There are now reports that President Obama will name Massachusetts Senator John Kerry to be the next secretary of defense. Apparently this is part of America’s new defense strategy to bore our enemies to death. – Jay Leno • There is no one who’s gonna be sitting on that stage who has the record of job creation I have. There’s one in particular who’s created jobs all around the world. While he was the governor of Massachusetts he didn’t create many jobs. – Rick Perry • There’s nothing noble or selfless about politicians and there never has been. Putting it charitably, Profiles in Courage is a compendium of Democratic mythology, ghostwritten for an ambitious young Massachusetts Senator who never did a thing for himself if he could pay to have it done by others. – L. Neil Smith • They know your name, address, telephone number, credit card numbers, who ELSE is driving the car “for insurance”, … your driver’s license number. In the state of Massachusetts, this is the same number as that used for Social Security, unless you object to such use. In THAT case, you are ASSIGNED a number and you reside forever more on the list of “weird people who don’t give out their Social Security Number in Massachusetts.” – Arthur Miller • This is an issue just like 9/11. We didn’t decide we wanted to fight the war on terrorism because we wanted to. It was brought to us. And if not now, when? When the supreme courts in all the other states have succumbed to the Massachusetts version of the law? – Rick Santorum • This is something which I think this country needs… I want universal coverage! I want everyone in Massachusetts and in this country to have insurance. I support universal health care. – Mitt Romney • To me there is nothing more fraught with mystery & terror than a remote Massachusetts farmhouse against a lonely hill. Where else could an outbreak like the Salem witchcraft have occurred? – H. P. Lovecraft • To the second end, we hold that minimum wage commissions should be established in the Nation and in each State to inquire into wages paid in various industries and to determine the standard which the public ought to sanction as a minimum; and we believe that, as a present installment of what we hope for in the future, there should be at once established in the Nation and its several States minimum standards for the wages of women, taking the present Massachusetts law as a basis from which to start and on which to improve. – Theodore Roosevelt • To-day Massachusetts; and the whole of the American republic, from the border of Maine to the Pacific slopes, and from the Lakes to the Gulf, stand upon the immutable and everlasting principles of equal and exact justice. The days of unrequited labor are numbered with the past. Fugitive slave laws are only remembered as relics of that barbarism which John Wesley pronounced “the sum of all villainies,” and whose knowledge of its blighting effects was matured by his travels in Georgia and the Carolinas. – Horace Mann • Two [Massachusetts coal burning power plants] remain: Brayton Point in the South Coast region and Mt. Tom, just down the road. Within the next four years, both should shut down and Massachusetts should finally end all reliance on conventional coal generation. – Deval Patrick • Want to hear a sad story about the Dukakis campaign? The governor of Massachusetts, he lost his top naval advisor last week. His rubber ducky drowned in the bathtub. – Dan Quayle • We always spend the summer together. My wife and kids, we always go back to Massachusetts and spend the summer there near where my wife and I both grew up. I wasn’t willing to sacrifice the summer to go elsewhere. – Steve Carell • We do have tough gun laws in Massachusetts. I support them. I won’t chip away at them. I believe they help protect us and provide for our safety. I’m sure my positions won’t make me the hero of the NRA. – Mitt Romney • We’ll be competitive with organized labor, we’re also competitive with regular, unorganized labor, working people who see their stakes and their future in the plans we’re putting forward to move Massachusetts forward. – Deval Patrick • What we want is not mainly to colonize Nebraska with free men, but to colonize Massachusetts with free men-to be free ourselves. As the enterprise of a few individuals, that is brave and practical; but as the enterprise of the State, it is cowardice and imbecility. What odds where we squat, or bow much ground we cover? It is not the soil that we would make free, but men. – Henry David Thoreau • What will people of the future think of us? Will they say, as Roger Williams said of the Massachusetts Indians, that we were wolves with the minds of men? Will they think that we resigned our humanity? They will have the right. – C.P. Snow • When abused children under court protection were studied in California and Massachusetts, it turned out that a disproportionate number of them were unattractive…abused kids had head and face proportions that made them look less infantile and cute. – Nancy Etcoff • When I was a kid, Eisenhower had been President forever, and all of a sudden, everything in the world was all about Jack Kennedy. I was 12, interested in politics; my father was from Massachusetts, had an accent like Kennedy. – James Ellroy • When I was Governor of Massachusetts, we worked to get Sable Island gas into New England. – Paul Cellucci • Where the heart is, there the muses, there the gods sojourn, and not in any geography of fame. Massachusetts, Connecticut River, and Boston Bay, you think paltry places, and the ear loves names of foreign and classic topography. But here we are; and, if we tarry a little, we may come to learn that here is best. See to it, only, that thyself is here;–and art and nature, hope and fate, friends, angels, and the Supreme Being, shall not absent from the chamber where thou sittest. – Ralph Waldo Emerson • With the presidential debates right around the corner, John Kerry is going to play Mitt Romney to help the President prepare for the debates. That’s kind of a stretch; a rich white guy from Massachusetts playing a rich white guy from Massachusetts. – Jay Leno • Without really analyzing it, I grew up in Massachusetts, so the Salem witch trials were always something that I was around. The average kindergartner probably doesn’t know about it, except that in Massachusetts, you do, because they’ll take you on field trips to see reenactments and stuff. – Rob Zombie • You go to towns in Massachusetts, Greenfield, first settled in 1686. Wouldn’t it be cool if it said, “Greenfield. First settled c. 13,000 B.P. or approximately 13,000 Before the Present. Resettled.” Maybe we could say even, “Resettled by whites,” Or, “Resettled anyway, 1686.” It would have a different impact. And of course it would help explain why the town is called Greenfield, because it was a green field and the fields were left by Native people who had already been farming them. – James W. Loewen

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equitiesstocks · 5 years

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Massachusetts State Quotes

Official Website: Massachusetts State Quotes

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cishetfeministdad · 7 years

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Also... Because of Me

Me Too... Also, because of me.

I have this blog and FB page, and honestly I do not visit it and write on it like I should. It is a place to post thoughts and memes that speak to me, but very rarely do I post original content like this today. Even so, most every week I get the barrage of notifications about men who have written or messaged me. I am called a cuckold, a faggot, and an array of other insults that often don't even make sense. All for the very small feat of reposting images and content made by others. This perplexes me, but has never surprised me.

My first time being sexually harassed for being a male who wears my emotions openly was was in high school. I was both verbally assaulted and physically groped by a group of guys who found me to effeminate. For the record, I am not actually even an effeminate male. I was called gay as an insult through most of high school years, which did not really bother me, since I had many friends who were gay and amazing. Hurting only in the part that I knew the people saying it intended it to hurt.

I have been sexually assaulted by a gay man as well. In every bit of misogynistic cliche he would come on hard and insistent, letting me know that even if I did not think I was gay he would show me truth. I had to stop hanging with some mutual friends to get away from his constant unsolicited touching of my body.

Yet, as I tell these stories they are twenty years behind me. I am well aware the female identifying people are not speaking of one time or occasional incidents occurring more than twenty years ago. Their harassment and assault is a recurring theme in their lives, having happened within the past 20 months, 20 weeks, 20 days, and for many 20 hours.

Also, I am aware that there are women who would tell their stories of harassment and assault and my name would be on their list. I have a friend who would tell the story of seeing Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves and being pinned in her seat between myself on one side and another guy on the other side who were both touching her without consent. I have the girl who learned of our game called "Flavor of the Week" where me and several friends picked a girl and competed to see who could make out with her first. I have the woman who actually broke her back and laid in bed healing waiting for me to come see her or even just call, because she felt we were in a relationship and I felt we were just making out. These are just the stories I know because I am friends with these women, and we have talked about them in the years since they took place.

How many more stories am I a part of that I do not know. I absolutely pressured women to move their boundaries, were these assault? I did not feel they were, but am sure now there are women who were involved that would say yes.

Again, I can tell these stories openly because I am separated by that same 20 year distance. I can tell you I have matured, and those stories represent another me in another time. That is a cop out, a refusal to really take responsibility for the damage I have been a part of. I, made those decisions, committed those acts, and actively urged women to blur lines making them uncomfortable. I have been part of problem, and every woman I see posts "Me too" reminds me of the others who's list holds my name.

I am working hard as a father, to give my daughter's a sense of unwavering self-agency. I am working hard with my son, to build respect and consent into the core DNA of his worldview now, rather than learning it so much later than I did. I am working hard as a dating adult to be intentional to never have a woman feel harassed, assaulted, or even pressured by me ever again. I am working hard as a fellow human to call out harassment when I see it, to speak boldly against the power of patriarchy, and to be a worthy ally in the fight for feminism.

In all this work it does not change that this issue remains, "because of me."

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traviswsoul · 7 years

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Day 27 Portland to Brooks Memorial State Park 0 miles

July 31 3:49 time, 2.004 calories, 13.2 avg mph 1,014' climbed Portland, as it does, sucked me in, I stayed for almost a week between my Uncle's and my friend Terron's. I was only going to stay at Terron's for two night but doubled that to stay and watch the UFC 214 on paper view which he and his brothers were getting. I'm glad I did, I have always enjoyed UFC, obviously for same bazaar, primal, man reason that had tens of thousands of Romans watching hundreds of gladiators and beasts tear each other apart regularly, I don't claim to understand it but I am glad that it is now a much more tame and civil servicing of our brutal desires. I also really appreciate watching people do things they are very good at and train hard for, my guilty pleasure is the TV talent show extravaganzas that dominate pop culture like the Voice and America's Got Talent. Of all the crap on TV I have nothing to say bad about these types of shows, celebrating talent will always be better than another mindless reality show glamorizing drama and dysfunction. However, cutting to commercial break right before the big moment almost ruins it for me every time knowing how it really is only about money and manipulating us but Grace Vanderveer's performances or seeing anyone be validated with admiration when they are terrified and self doubting is always worth the wait. I love them because they remind us that people are awesome and despite the highly competitive nature of this dog eat dog world we get to see people rooting for people and being excited about positive things, we could us more of that, and I'll sit through the commercials for it. I'll probably complain about capital and consumerism as I do but I'll wait. The UFC is an exhibition of the top tear of overall human athleticism and even if there wasn't something in my wiring that was pleased by watching men hurt each other (a primal things that baffles me and I'm not proud to admit) I would still be intrigued by these specimens of commitment, determination, nutrition, breadth of study, strength, endurance and will. It was different this time because I was right in the middle of personally treating my fitness with more awareness and respect than I ever have. I'm working harder than ever on this trip, observing my bodies adaptations is intriguing, seeing the results is awesome, yet I am no where near the physical capacity or knowledge that a champion fighter has. This heightened my interest when the opportunity arose to watch what was being hailed as the UFC's most exciting ticket ever, so I stayed and me and Terron got to catch up, talk about life, our struggles, our dreams, women, work and we did some really fun stuff along the way. The first night at his crib was low key, I arrived before he was done working and luckily there was a key under the mat (don't tell anyone). I introduced myself to Salmon, his soft, sweet, fat cat and we were soon napping together on the couch. I fully embraced the nap this Portland vacation knowing well enough how much rest my body was asking for. I woke up starving as usual and the house he was painting took longer than usual so I went out to find the German spot I knew he was wanting to take me to. I found Steigelhaus down the street and ordered the pickled vegetable plate, a pretzel of course, and a beer, it was all delicious and soon enough my old buddy showed up and we were thrilled to see each other, a big hug later and we were reunited, it had been years, he and I met when we starting modeling about the same time in Milan, Italy. We've since been all over the place together as we were the faces of Polo for several years and ended up living near each other in Brooklyn. Oh the memories! There are several things in my life that I have to give credit to Terron for, none less than Yoga! Terron is the one that took me to my first Yoga class at the Bikram Studio in Union Square in NYC. That changed my life. I absolutely would not be who I am or on the path I am had it not been for that. I will forever be grateful to my friend Terron for that blessed gift. We have had a few ups and downs over the years but when I knew I'd be in Portland he jumped to the top of the list of who I had to call, he's one of those guys you know you could call for anything and he'd do all he could to help you. A big part of our relationship is how much each of us discovered our selves and grew up along the way parallel to each other. We were both having exceptional careers in our generation of models and were the stars of our agency for that time. We both owe a lot to our agent (and my dear friend) Jason Kanner, the man who shaped my 20's more than any other and to whom I'm the most grateful! We made a lot of money, we spent a lot of money, we traveled the world, we became NYC locals and unbeknownst to us great friends along the way. The second night I was there Brendon, Terron's older brother, drove us to Salem for Karaoke. The Woods brothers are great singers and karaoke naturals, I wish I could sing like that! They sang the Killers, King's of Leon, Matisyahu, and several other challenging vocalist's hits. I enjoyed the music and, again, seeing people who are good at something they love and going out and doing it as this was not an amateur karaoke night. The next day, after a nap of course, we went to the old swimmin hole Terron grew up in and floated the river for an hour. There was a house there that had a huge telephone pole stuck in the ground, I assume it was there for exactly the reason I observed because it had a small platform mounted on top that a hawk had made a nest on. It was really beautiful, I watched it as long as could, there were two hawks with white heads and black and gray bodies, absolutely regal and majestic. I didn't get to see them fly off or see any others arrive although I kept hoping to. After we got out we recovered the longboards we had stashed in the blackberry bushes at our exit point before we drove down and jumped in so we skated back through a neighborhood, found the truck, and went for prime rib and mashed potatoes, with plenty of Horseradish Cream sauce, just like my brother has always had it and now I guess I'm the same because I ordered a second serving of it! We were sufficiently sun beat and digesting meat, we called it a day. The next day the great idea was to drive half an hour to play disc golf. This is something I have been wanting to do for my entire adult life and never had the chance. Terron is pretty good at it and has a full collection of discs. That is an activity I could, and plan on, really getting used to! It's super chill, it's outside, requires very honed skill, there are endless way to improve, it's basically free and required minimal exertion. Most of my activities require high levels of exertion so I really appreciated the laid back nature of this sport, it's like golf, minus all the country club-ness. After that we made our way to his parents place for the fight, which was everything you want out a fight night you pay fifty bucks to watch. Terron and Brenden are certainly UFC super fans and were great to watch it with. The next day it was back to the real world, err, my real world for the time being. Because I had stayed two extra days Terron drove me 100 miles down the road and up the hill. It was a 3,000 foot climb and I don't have any part of me that tells me I don't succeed if I don't ride every single mile so we road tripped down along the Columbia river on highway 84 then turned north on 97, crossed the river which is the border and found ourselves in Washington state. This was the only part of eastern Washington I have ever seen, Maryhill, an uber famous downhill run that we have had world cup races at every year that was traveling and racing downhill skateboards. We pulled off at the overlook where you can see most of the hill and I had a mini sentimental moment there with all the memories from a very different part of my life. It was weird being there and not having a skateboard or a hundred of my friends, I miss those days, there not over! The nearest town is Goldendale, another easily missed little town if not for that hill. We used to stay in the hotels or campsites there and I know it well. Fifteen miles past that we found the Brooks Memorial state park on the west side of the street and I was "home." I set up camp while Terron napped on the picnic table and eventually we said our goodbyes, I hope it's not so long again until we reunite. I climbed into my tent and read more of Thomas Paine's classic The Age Of Reason, I suggest this for everyone. It's brilliant, it's so many things I have spent the last decade of my life coming to understand all distilled into easily consumed pages and I have been pouring over it, I can't believe this book didn't some to me sooner except for the fact that I know everything that teaches me comes to me at exactly the right time. The title "The Age of Reason" caught my eye at the Nakima RV Resort on a "give one take one"' bookshelf in the laundry room. It sat there amongst fiction and self help books and called to me, I took it, I didn't have one to leave but I was grateful and I don't think my karma will suffer. It took a few days to make time read among all the demanding writing schedule I have made for myself but now that I did I'm hooked! If you have ever struggled with why religion seems to be such a big shitty man made monster now but can't jump straight to nihilism/ atheism then this books for you. Paine essentially shits all over religion while maintaining and true scholar's approach to scientific and rational deduction of knowledge. His point so far is not just that religion is wrong and stupid but that it was flawed from the get go because it was crafted by men in order to make populations more moldable and profitable. We don't need any structure to teach us about God! Creation is the only case that needs to be made or observed in order to understand divinity and our place in it. I'm only in the first half but he's already gotten into the triangle being the foundation for math and then science and understanding the rules of the universe. Namely, the movements of the heavens which parallel the law of physics on earth from which we can understand the magnitude and omniscience of our God, creation, our place, our divinity and reason all without needing any hint of dogma, fundamentalism, sin, shame

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