Today's word

causerie /kohz-REE/ - 1. an informal conversation : chat  2 : a short informal essay

The write-up does a nice job of explaining how the second definition developed from the first one. One popular usage is often all it takes. This is a nice new word for me, but I don't know that I'll get much of a chance to invoke it. 

empty

i need a news-free cocoon. forever.

The other attempted suicide story . . .

. . . that I recently read - maybe early last week - was about a guy who had a lightning bolt tattoo that he almost never talked about. One night he'd been drinking and told a friend the story behind it. Some time in his past he'd grown weary of dealing with his darkness, and decided to end his life. His gun misfired, but before he realized that, in the moment after he'd actually pulled the trigger to the point of releasing the firing pin, he instantly regretted what he'd done. He was unspeakably relieved when it didn't fire. As it happened, there was a thunderstorm that night, and the lightning became a symbol for him and a reminder that, no matter how bad things might get, he doesn't really want to die.

Sometimes I still have self-destructive thoughts

For a couple minutes yesterday i was feeling incredibly stressed out and frustrated, to the point (excuse the unintended pun) that i considered whether it would be possible to jam my pen through my temple. i recognized the madness in the impulse, and rejected it, and soon worked past it. Though they won't know of it, i'm sure my coworkers would be grateful for that, not to mention the people who love me.

i am, gratefully, long past the days when i would sit on the kitchen floor with the cold steel of the sharpened chef's knife pressed against my wrist. but i still have vestige impulses of the habit of not wanting to live anymore. The two stories i read this month from people who survived suicide attempts help with putting those impulses into perspective. i still think i could probably benefit from more therapy to further help with that, but don't really want to explain why i'd be going there again. 

Today's words

nuncupative /NUN-kyoo-pay-tiv/ - spoken rather than written : oral

I'd encountered this word before, but don't think I got its meaning quite right from context.

burke /berk/ -  1. to suppress quietly or indirectly  2 : bypass, avoid

Okay, from the write-up you can see how this word came into being and got these meanings, but there are clearly some steps of the linguistic journey missing.

"How DARE you . . .

. . . PRESUME for a MOMENT to associate yourself more with these countless wounded women than with their abusers?"

- what my brain or my adversary (are they the same? I am he?) is screaming at me today. 

Today's words

Due to technical difficulties, I've fallen behind on the WOTD:

tendentious /ten-DEN-shus/ - marked by a tendency in favor of a particular point of view : biased

Though they each claim otherwise, both Fox News and NPR are more than slightly tendentious. I can't believe I've lived by life thus far without this word in my vocabulary, especially in such polarized times.

interdigitate /in-ter-DIJ-uh-tayt/ - to become interlocked like the fingers of folded hands

I love it when a new word means exactly what it looks like it should mean.

Other recent WsOTD that are in my recognition vocabulary but not my regular usage rotation: agita, vituperate, prehension, denegation, chary, and one that I primarily use in its adjectival form, palliate.

I don't know what to say

I want to complain, but I know I shouldn't. 

I want to be the man I should be, but I fear I can't. 

I want to want what I have decided, but I still want what I have wanted for decades now. 

I want to see the people I love walk according to God's plan for them, but I struggle to do so myself.

So tired

The Golden Gate jump survivor

The first thing that struck me in his story, and probably the most important, was the panicked regret he felt the instant he was clear of the rail.

The other thing that strikes me, for others, and maybe with a hope of comfort for myself, was how those who've attempted (or committed) suicide so often regret, once it's usually too late, hurting the people they love. Did my dad feel that way, in that fleeting moment between when he pulled the trigger and when the bullet irreparably destroyed his brain?

For that matter, did he love me?

I have a great idea

Why don't you tell your kids, who already have multiple layers of abandonment issues, that they're a bunch of spoiled brats and you're going to leave and never come back?

I'm writing this here rather than confronting you with it because I'm sure you're already hurting over having said this to them. But girl, hug them. Heal them. Help them renounce the spirit of rejection, the spirit of failure, the spirit of self-judgment, the fear of abandonment. And renounce whatever spirit of inadequacy in you led you to tell them such an awful lie.

I love you.

Unbound seminar

I love this ministry. I love helping people walk in the freedom which Christ has won for us. I love helping them recognize that they can kick out the negative spiritual influences which have taken root in their lives, for one reason or another. I love helping people see forgiveness of others as a gift that God longs to give us and complete in us.

We had close to 50 new people come from at least six states (Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Tennessee, Illinois; possibly Indiana) to receive new freedom in Christ. I got to pray with a dear friend and help him receive forgiveness. It is such a privilege and blessing to be a part of this ministry!

Unbound!

Symbols

Liberals and conservatives have both been more concerned with their own point of view on this issue than with hearing each other's. Each insists that the viewpoint that really matters is their own.

Yes, the flag and the anthem are symbols, but they're not *just* symbols.

And yes, the country is the people (and, I would argue with conviction, the Constitution, which exists for the people), all the people.

Do I see the irony of a protest attacking the symbols of the country that allows such protest? Absolutely.

Do I think that the government has any business interfering in that protest? None whatsoever.

Do I think that the business owners have a right to stifle that protest if they choose? Yes, I do.

Do I think that fans shouldn't choose to respond against a protest when they disagree with it's form? Not at all.

But I am absolutely fed up with both sides refusing to acknowledge the concerns of the other, and elevating their own values above the others.

People who insist on honoring the national anthem and the flag "the right way" need to understand that those who are expressing themselves in protest are doing so with good intentions and for good reason. They feel that the maltreatment of minority members of society is important enough to them to take whatever shocking action is needed to shake the majority out of complacency. They have seen their perspective repeatedly disregarded when they have tried to be heard. They are not ungrateful of the sacrifices that people have made; but even though they live in a great nation in which they have freedoms and opportunities they appreciate, they are fed up with the status quo and feel an obligation to use the platform their talent provides for them to try to make things better by increasing everyone's awareness of the problem.

People will always insist on protesting through actions that the majority feels are disrespectful of the nation which these symbols represent and, particularly the sacrifices of those who have given their all to create and preserve this nation. Ironically, this is what gives them the freedom to express themselves in this way, and it is important for them to understand that protesting in this way will keep many people from ever hearing their message. And those who disagree with them have just as much right to decide not to spend their entertainment money on people who are acting in ways which they have always been taught is disrespectful.

Today's word

farceur /fahr-SER/ - 1. joker, wag  2. a writer or actor of farce or satire

I'd never heard this word, but, of course! Great etymology, too. 

It was a sunny, dark day

It became brightest as my bride and I hiked through the gorge as the sun sank low in the sky.