It’s been a while…

So, it’s been a while.  I am shutting down my other blog – completely, eventually.  I need to let all of that go.  I have reached the understanding that I am not the mom, therefore, I have no child, etc., and need to seriously just live my own life.  I gave up on my daughter – not that I don’t love her, but that she doesn’t love me so why torture myself.

I have learned that hateful, mean-spirited and nasty seem to be part and parcel of the lives that part of me lives and therefore want nothing more to do with it.

Life goes on…. I will continue, live, love and laugh…. I have great friends and relatives that want me around…

Be well.  Back soon.

 

Who I am….

Tags

Poetry

As I shed the who that I am,

Walking through the door to who I will be,

I become,

Again,

Who I am….

 

The doorway, a small space,

A blink,

A place in time where I am/am not,

A change…..

On the other side,

As I emerge,

I am so much more,

I am so much less….

 

As I walk through the door,

I become, I un-become….

Who I am.

(c) Lori Trevino 1-16-16

Loving, Protecting…. or Handicapping?

Tags

Parenting

I have written about this before, but it really needs to be said…..  Parents, the one thing that you/we all do is “protect” our children.  We protect them to the point of handicapping them, if we aren’t careful.  How is that possible?  Well, there are a lot of ways to handicap a child.  Over-parenting, helicopter parenting, over protection and many more.

The Over-parenting parent is someone that guides to the point that their children don’t have a clue how to make or when to make their own decision on any given subject, idea or project.  This would be my issue if I had children.  I tend to want to guide and for things to go my way.  I see this a lot in parents that feel that their children are somehow capable of perfection if only they do everything exactly how they want it.  This, however, tends to leave children unsure of themselves and insecure in their own ability to make a good decision or create on their own.

Helicopter Parents – these are people that hover and are so involved in their children’s lives that the child, often in their teen years, breaks out and acts out because they feel suffocated.  Unfortunately, it doesn’t help the child mature, but tends to make them rebellious in excess.

Over Protective/non-helicopter Parents – these people are interesting.  They usually barely know who their child really is and often believe that they are “close” to their children.  They protect the child no matter what and eventually, as all children do, the child learns how to manipulate that “protection” to include covering for truly bad behaviors, irresponsibility and other horrible things.  These parents don’t feel that they are bad or wrong because they are “just protecting” their child from those evil people out there – like police, teachers, etc.  While they love their child, they don’t understand that children are real people and they make mistakes, do bad stuff and often, without meaning to be, are cruel.  I know a lot of these parents.

“Everyone Wins” Parents…. These parents are almost pathetic. These parents are so sure that telling their child that “they will do better next time” is damaging to the child, they tend to kill the drive that makes the child try to win.  These parents will go out of their way to make a child who has done nothing to win, except show up, that they are special, that they have forgotten the basics… make showing up fun – making winning the goal.  They cripple the child’s ability to strive for more and give them unrealistic expectations for their futures.  After all, just showing up to work will not get you ahead – working to win will.  The drive to compete with themselves can’t be instilled in someone who is rewarded for simply being alive.

Presents vs Love/Time Parents…. these parents are the most damaging – in my opinion.  They will, instead of taking the time to make that trip to the crazy kids museum or vacation to some place interesting, do things like buy them a “hover Board” for $499 – and then spend their time with someone else, doing anything but spend time with the child who is now on a machine that can and has broken bones in the few weeks it has been out on the market.  The expensive cell phone, replaced repeatedly because breaking it is the only time mom or dad notices that they aren’t in touch with their child…. then of course there is the expensive clothes – shoes – toys – throughout the year, but not a day spent at a picnic or going to the movies or just doing something together.  Eventually, and this is true HUGE because I deal with these children on a daily basis, they believe that love comes in the form of a gift – any gift – and that anyone that won’t or can’t “gift” to them does not love them or value them and therefore is not a worthy human being.

These things are some of the most damaging things you can do to a child.  It is okay to protect your child, just remember that failing is an option and that they really don’t want you at their party/dance, but they do want you to go to performances and sporting events.  It is okay to know that your child is not perfect, as long as you love them and make sure that they know it – not with an expensive gift, but the most reasonable gift of all, time and attention.  Not the hovering, stifling kind – but the sharing, caring kind… the picnic, the ballgame, the afternoon shopping for nothing….eating ice cream and laughing.  That is what is important.  The pizza after a game lost, but played well.  The movie night or game night that brings conversation, laughter and joy…..

Parents, don’t make your kids dependent, incapable and afraid of life… give them the biggest, best gift of all – yourselves, your time, your love and your honesty.

Social Politeness, or… what?

I have noted several things that make me shake my head in wonder.  The thing is, no one else seems to notice them….or at least they pretend that they don’t notice.  What are these things, you ask?  Well, to start with – What happened to teaching girls to be independent and to love themselves?  Then there is that other part of it, which is teaching girls that they aren’t the sum of how big their boobs, butts or thighs are or how important that is to some guy…. And, combining all that, what happened to teaching girls that if a man is a man he doesn’t treat her like a piece of meat or property?  Then, and this is something I will never get without serious explanation, how can people pretend that someone is okay, when they know that the person needs help?

Starting at the beginning.  Ladies, young, old, whatever, you need to really look at yourselves.  To see you, not the way some man sees you or another woman, but the way you really are.  Because frankly, most of you are beautiful, lovely, warm and kind… as long as you choose to be.  What difference does it really make if someone else thinks that?  NONE!  You have to see it.  To embrace it.  Because until you can embrace you, no one else can really touch you.

That being said, remember this, no one has the right to tell you how to dress, who to talk to, when to do anything – outside of work or school or parents – because you are more than capable of being reasonable human beings.  And this includes someone claiming to love you and then telling you how to behave.  If you can’t do that, then you are nothing more than the piece of meat or property that they are treating you like and no one can help you.

Now, my real thought here – my focus – Can someone please tell me how pretending someone who is in need of help is okay is healthy?   I mean, I know people that still think it is okay to abuse others.  I see it a lot in young men.  They think love is telling a girl what to do, how to do it and on and on – and girls that think that this is the way they are supposed to be loved?  And to top it, the violence, anger and abusive behaviors that people simply pretend are okay… what is that?

Someone told me that they thought this guy I know gets away with things because he is young and other people either are afraid of what he is capable of or that they see promise in there… and my thought was “WTF??”  If you are afraid of someone, you don’t protect them from help!  If you love them, you make them get help – even if it hurts you!

Maybe that is because there is very little I am truly afraid of.  This is true, however, I still won’t stand by and let someone self-destruct or abuse another person because of fear or some ridiculous idea that they are somehow going to outgrow behaviors that are ingrained in them….

Which brings it full circle, ladies – if a guy is 17/18/19 and older, he is not going to change.  Period!  If he is willing to be abusive now, he will be abusive later.  AND LOVE IS NOT JEALOUS OR DEMEANING….

Just saying.

Choice….

Tags

Poetry

 

You can’t handle my realness, my pain, my laughter, my strength, my weakness….

You can’t handle the world I live in, it’s joy, it’s beauty, it’s sorrow, it’s darkness….

You can’t handle the life that I have, it’s beauty, it’s depth, it’s total aliveness….

You can’t handle …. me…..

I won’t live in your falsity, your cheap laugh, your fake smile, your brittle nothingness….

I won’t live in the paper construct of your world, it’s thin veneer, it’s cheap paint, it’s tawdry lies…

I won’t live the non-life, it’s bleak face, it’s nonexistent depths, it’s death….

I won’t handle ….. you……

I choose the bright, beautiful, life that has pain and joy sprinkled liberally through it….

I choose to see the dark and know that it is but an interlude into the dappled sunlit glade…

I choose to swim in the shark filled strange waters, with depth and warmth and cold sharing the same space…..

I choose …. LIFE…..

(c) Lori Trevino 11-18-2015

Killing Ourselves

We out of charity or abundance of love,

Kick the legs out from under our children,

Destroying their chances of facing and owning their fears,

Destroying their need to succeed and grow in the face of adversity,

The same adversity that gives them strength and wings,

The same adversity that gave us strength and wings,

The same adversity that gave our ancestors strength and wings.

We out of ignorance and fear,

Overprotect and coddle to the point of incapacitation,

Not just our children, but our society,

Which must, of necessity, carry forward the arguments of the past,

Using new voices, thoughts and ideas,

But in our zeal to protect,

We have poisoned ourselves,

Destroyed the power that made our lives so important,

Made our society weak and powerless to grow and succeed.

We have, without thought, created our own epitaph,

The sounds of our dying are all around us,

Children that are ill because they have poor immune systems,

Old people left on the streets, in homes designed for dying, not living,

Not allowed to share in the beauty that is the wisdom of their years,

Worshipping the ignorance and splendor of the energy of youth,

Forgetting the pain that we ourselves went through to leave that youth behind.

We are….

Killing ourselves.

(c) Lori Trevino 10-23-2015

The NeoHippy – Judgmental …..

This morning as I went out to spend the little bit of cash I had for my food this week, something interesting happened.  Now, I am an early riser and the weather is lovely and cool in the mornings so I took my Reggie with me.  He loves to go for a ride.  We went to the bank, then over to Petco to pick up some pet bedding for the class guinea pig.  Petco does adoptions of dogs and other pets that are about to be put down by the city.

As I arrived I parked next to what I would consider an enormous, gas guzzling, over priced SUV with 2 or 3 children in it…one looked to be around 3 years old and not strapped into a car seat but running around the vehicle.  I didn’t notice adults, but then, I really wasn’t looking that hard… the windows were rolled up and it seemed okay.  Probably someone at the Dollar Store just picking up a quick something…. no big thing.

Well, I took Reggie and in we went.  He was in heaven!  A store that I could take him into!  YAY!  People that weren’t afraid of him and two little boys stopped to pet him!  Then, out of the “adoption” area came a very aggressive pitbull mix… he was snarling and carrying on – jerking on the heavy lead and pulling on an owner that seemed okay, but it was freaking out the Reggie.  We paid the bill and went back to the car.

The SUV still had a few kids in it and no adults around, but again, it was quiet and the doors were locked….so I thought, Okay…. I put Reggie in the car, told him to behave and made sure the windows were slightly open.  The sun had started to warm up, but it still wasn’t “hot”.  I went into the Dollar Store, got what I needed, paid and hurried back…. the pitbull owner was parked next to me, opposite of the SUV and I was worried Reggie would get a brave alpha streak and destroy the car.

As I was getting into the car to leave a very nice looking, long-haired, “Reptile Rescue” shirt wearing young man opened the driver’s door of the SUV….. Reggie, of course, needing a drink of water and curious, poked his nose out.  I politely said hello, nice shirt, reptiles huh? and he said, sneering at me over his $80 hair style, and through the stench of his very expensive cologne (you know, the stuff that mimics the smell of good ol soap and water, but isn’t), sporting his equally expensive Nike shoes…. “Um, you know it is a felony to lock a dog in a parked car?”  I look over his shoulder at the kids still sitting in the car… “Yeah, it wasn’t hot and I am careful”

He sneers again, “Yeah, but heat stroke happens fast.”

As I pull away, I look back at him in the mirror – shouting at the kids in his gas guzzling monster and wonder WTF was that?  Reggie, in the car less than 1/2 the time those kids were – my car a silver car with the windows partly down… how is that worse than 3 kids locked in a completely closed Black SUV?

The whole thing took less than a minute to exchange, but it was such a shock to realize that, in my current experience, the most NEOHippy folks out there are the worst offenders to the health of the world!

First – the money thing – they are the ones that will scream like starving baboons over $20….but they will piss it away on ridiculous without a thought.  Come on people, an SUV that size for a family of 4?  Why?  Because they can afford it!  You can call it whatever you want, but the truth is simply that it is status.

Nikes?  Get real!  Nike is the worst of the child labor companies – without shame or care because consumers are so wrapped up in the fact that some sports personality is the main money/face for the company they would buy their products if they were made on the streets of Phoenix, Arizona by homeless people who were paid with a bottle of water a day!

Second – Okay, so you are a save the animals person – WTF is wrong with you!  Your kids are sitting in a vehicle that will heat up to twice what mine will and you are worried about my dog?  My dog who is alone for less than 15 minutes – while your kids are in the car for over 45 minutes?  Screw you, you moron!  My dog at least would have gotten help asap – since I am not so wrapped up in my business that I don’t know that it is getting hot and he can’t take the heat either!  You apparently were shopping in the Petco and weren’t worried about whether or not those kids were getting hot!

Third – really?  You are going to tell me that it is a felony to let my dog get heat stroke, yet you don’t realize that it is murder to kill a child by locking them in a hot car?  Worse, you are going to sit there and take a pic of my car because of it?  Please feel free to tweet it – if you do – I will feel free to call CPS on your stupid child abusing ass!

The truth is, this is the norm!  The more “socially conscious” of the people I have met are the ones that do the stupidest shit.  The lady that is in the grocery store with her own bags, will often (at least here in Tucson, AZ) be the one getting into the gas hog in the parking lot, to drive to her house that is equipped with air conditioning units that are not freon free…. to sip her soda out of a plastic cup and who will use plastic containers until they are useless, but then throw them in the trash instead of the recycling bin.

The ones that judge others, openly, as this man did are the ones that don’t consider that my little car is equipped to be more ecofriendly and that will not be the one that uses the ton of fuel.  Yeah – they get 25 mpg – I get 33+ mpg.  Yeah, they have such a lovely ride…. until the vehicle hits someone and kills them because they weigh almost what a diesel does.  They are the ones that will bitch about the roads, and then roar down them, in their over sized beasts, because, oh wait for it…. they can! and then complain about pot holes.  Which, by the way, are usually caused by over sized vehicles and over use of roadways by those vehicles – those weight limits are a requirement because it protects the roads people!

But what irritates me most, they are the jackasses that will complain about people like me, and then do exactly what they please because they can…. sigh… what a pain in the ass!

I am from…..

Tags

Poem, Poetry

(For my students!)

 

I am from the smell of oil paints,

From pieces of wire, hot and dripping from the welder,

The smell of my mother’s bread dripping with butter,

I am from Sunday drives,

Walking in the woods,

From pictures my father painted,

The nudes painted in our living room of my 6 yr old house.

 

I am from reading in bed with a flashlight,

From the ruins of the Mesa Verde,

The pot shards, cactus and coyotes.

I am from racing the roadrunner on the way to see my grandfather.

 

I am from the loneliness of foster care,

The joy of friends,

Laughing and ditching school,

Fighting and drinking too much.

 

I am from the Army,

Straight lines, guns and grenades,

Crying when I was scared,

I am from LIFE!

(c) Lori Trevino 10-29-2015

You Wonder Why I Run

Tags

Poem

You came to me crying mommy!

Yet, the moment it became inconvenient, you walk away.

Saying that it isn’t real, not what you want.

Your indiscriminate love is scary,

Terrifying to the world of me.

The strength of me fails in the face of the constant onslaught of rage, hate, anger.

Nothing you say is real,

Leaving me in the smoke of your anger,

The mire of shit that you call love, without a clue as to what you really want.

Nothing that is real touches or does these things in a life that has always been one that needs,

Nay requires that all be balanced and even.

The foul stench of rotting emotional garbage,

Stretching out around your so called love,

Never allowing anything to clean it,

Never letting anyone purify the soul that you have filled with this muck,

And you wonder why I run?

You call me mommy when my wallet is full,

My home is nice,

The perception is that you believe that you have some right,

As if I owe you more than the life I gave you at the expense of my sanity,

My dreams, my love, and my deepest needs.

The life I gave freely, designed to be loved,

Cherished and longed for,

Yet soiled, beyond the horrifying depths of the pits that some call hell.

Never realizing, never knowing that you chose this pit, this slime,

Over the easy emotional response of a person that can love you,

That needs nothing from you beyond simple respect and the ability to communicate,

Simply for a paper or coin that means almost nothing beyond the necessary things in life.

And you wonder why I run?

You called me mommy,

And I have never considered, never even thought that your rage at another would be so toxic,

Invading this world,

To this place that I created out love,

Out of balance and beauty,

To simply fill it with the drains of pus, slimy and green with poisons,

Seeping out of your emotional baggage,

Drenching my world with illness and anger,

Never healing wounds that ooze and burst anew,

The words spoken without thought,

Creating more and more wounds that never heal,

That ooze and eventually, as must be,

You wonder why I run.

(c) Lori Trevino 10-21-2015

To those people who are always texting or checking their cell phones:

Tags

manners

While I respect that some people need to stay in touch with either their job or someone for a personal reason if you are texting or constantly looking at your phone while you are out with someone – at least be polite enough to excuse yourself! Just because it is important to you, most people are pretty mellow about it…. but you have to be straight up about “I have to get this” – just like you would if you had to take a phone call. I hate it when someone is out with me, no matter who they are, and they start texting or they check their phone repeatedly and don’t let me know that it is important for whatever reason. I find it rude and emotionally hurtful – not just by making me uncomfortable, but because it tells me that I have no value to them as a person.

Signed:

Woman sitting across from you and the person you supposedly wanted to spend time with.