Agent of Change

A Blog by Cory!! Strode, who really should write something interesting here.

27 Nov 2017

How are you?

When I left the field of Juvenile Justice, I learned that I no longer said “How are you” the way other people do. Most of the time, when we say that, we’re not REALLY asking if you are doing all right, it’s a standard nothing greeting.  I have had people in my life who complain that when they ask someone how they are, they actually tell them about the negative things in their life.

By The Way, I tend to spend less time talking to those people now.

I think it’s kind of sad that we are taught to respond to “How are you” with “Terrific, never better!” I was taught that in classes, seminars that the like and it always made me wince.  I understand the reasoning behind it, but a socially acceptable lie is still a lie.

I don’t like it. So, when I ask “How are you,” I am asking out of wanting to know how you actually are.  Has something wonderful happened lately?  Great!  Please share it with me! Have you been feeling out of sorts?  I’m sorry you feel that way, tell me about it.  Are you just this close to something finally being achieved? Wonderful, please share it with me! Have you had a rough day? That blows, I’m ready to listen.

We all say we want a better world, so maybe one way to do that is to ask people “How are you” and not expect them to be a shining beacon of Dale Carnegie positivity and triumph. Just be willing to listen when someone tells you about their life.

Much love to friends old and now and….how are you?

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Posted in Personal
17 Nov 2017

Y’all Need To Find Something To Do

As I am working a lot more than normal (how is that possible, you may ask, and all I have to say is, I always find a way), but personal internet time is severely limited. When I am not working, I usually only have about an hour or two, and to unwind, I have been watching old episodes of MST3K and laughing pretty damn hard.

I have put up a couple of things on Twitter, since I can just drop them and not think about it afterward or be compelled to dig into what others are saying. I listen to a little bit of news on the BBC on my way to work or home so I don’t feel totally isolated.

I checked on Facebook yesterday when I had a spare minute, and one of the posts I had had generated over 200 responses. I won’t get into them other than to say, y’all need to find better things to do that yell at each other and call each other names on social media.  No one’s mind will be changed.  No one will “win” an argument.  No one is keeping score.  You won’t “own” anyone and your clever cruel remarks will fall on deaf ears.

No one will listen to you.

Let me repeat that again for the people in the back: NO ONE WILL LISTEN TO YOU.

If you and your buddies are having fun poking the people on the other side, you are the problem. Period.  Full stop.

I hear constantly “Why won’t liberals/conservatives listen to me!” Maybe because you call them libtards, hillbillies, snowflakes, dotards, and on and on and on.  I’d also like to let you know that when you start talking like that, you really aren’t saying anything anyone will listen to because you are just parroting what you heard.  Recently, someone sent me a nastygram calling me a “Beta cuck libtard snowflake SJW”.  Rather than hurting me, it made me think that the person hadn’t had an original thought in their life and we just vomiting up what they read somewhere and thought “heh, I’ll show those people who make me feel bad!”

My mind has been changed by my experiences and by learning, never by someone shouting at me and calling me names. All that gets you is blocked.

I say it all the time:  If you hurt me, even a little bit, you can fuck the fuck off.

And if I can pull that trigger on someone I have known for almost 20 years or in-laws, I have no problem doing it to random internet hatetroll.

In a perfect world, I’d ask you to quit talking and posting and listen. Listen to what people you disagree with say.  Ask them how they came to where they are in life.  Try to understand the fear that drives them to hate.

But, instead, I’ll just say that y’all need to find better things to do, so here’s a list:

  • Take a hike on the nature trails in your area.
  • Visit an art gallery or a museum and think about what was going through the mind of the artist as they created.
  • Read a book just for fun, some genre you enjoy like a mystery or action novel. Then find one in a used book store from 40 year ago in the same genre to see how writing has changed.
  • Try to find the best pizza in your city.
  • Listen to my podcasts, ya bastards.
  • Watch a foreign film. Yes, Godzilla counts.
  • Get involved in a toy drive or something for Christmas and see how you can do little things that really help people who need it.
  • I have four podcasts going, listen to them and then buy from our sponsors.
  • Make a list of how your life has improved in the last year, and if the list is too short, get to work fixing things.

Then again, you aren’t going to listen to me either. Everyone is just talking at us, not to us, and we may expect everyone to hear us, we don’t want to listen to what anyone else has to say.

Must love to friends old and new and again, y’all need to find something else to do.

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Posted in Personal, Politics
08 Nov 2017

What I am thinking about today, 11/8/2017

  1. One of the great things about NaNoWriMo (National novel writing month) is the sheer speed of it. You don’t have time to go back and fix things, you just keep going. Yesterday, I wrote myself into a brick wall, came up with a new character and now have a great comedy sequence that moves the story forward AND ups the tension. For the second act.
  2. I am writing a fairly epic blog post about Brian Michael Bendis jumping to DC. I think this is a big deal, not because of the series he was writing for Marvel, but how deep he was in Marvels entire creative process on TV show, animation, video games and the like. This is a very big deal and will change the creative flow of Marvel. Will he make a change at DC? Hard to say. DC is kind of a mess, creatively, right now, with a few books generating interest, but the vast majority reading like mid 90’s Marvel with C grade characters.
  3. No word on MST3k’s second Netflix season or a Turkey Day for 2017. Hey, Netflix, you gave Marco Polo a second season, what the hell?
  4. There was a big election last night where things changed. I don’t trust it. It’s an off-off year, and only the people really mad came out. 2016 showed that America is fine with racism, hate and totalitarianism and I have seen nothing that convinces me that it has changed. I have given up on Americans and only live here because I don’t have the means to leave or anywhere to go.
  5. People don’t change. They may change for a while, but they will always return to baseline. It’s the one thing I am sure of.
  6. I have been on 12 hour days at the FT job due to it being our busy season. I am waking up, going to work, coming home, eating something, going to bed and doing it all again. I thought I would get a break, since the part-time job has slowed and I am only there two or three nights a week. I was wrong.
  7. I now just leave my phone in the car when I am at the FT job. Meh.
  8. It looks like I have the entire Thanksgiving weekend off. I am going to get requited with my gym, my streaming services and the huge pile of books that has been building up since Labor Day.
  9. The Universal “shared universe” where they will reboot their classic monsters has been shelved. Again. DC has stated their upcoming movies may not be connected. Making an interconnected movies universe it’s damn hard, kids.
  10. I haven’t been making with the positivity much lately. Maybe I too am reverting to who I was before 1999. Not that it seems to matter. Meh.
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Posted in Personal, Politics, Writing
07 Nov 2017

Rough weekend

This was a rough weekend. I was at work for most of it, and we have sick clients, burned out staff, and the two are a brutal combination.  Staff had little patience and clients wanted to be taken care of and left alone at the same time.  They also had a lot of…well, you’ve been around sick people.

They are messy.

And not in a “left their socks in the living room” kind of messy.

I am also dealing with our busiest time at the full time job, sleeping away from home most every night and normal life stresses, so while I tried pretty hard to have patience with the clients, when they staff would start to lose patience, I didn’t have it in me to confront them. Instead, I would just step in and help the client back to their room, clean up the bathroom AGAIN or find things to help people calm down.  It took a lot out of me, so by the time I got home yesterday at 3 pm (and I’d been at work since 9 pm the night before) I just didn’t want to do anything.

The thought in my head after hearing the news headlines was “I give up.”

Part of it is how tired I was. Part of it was my lack of a personal life. Part of it was how little energy I have. Part of it was how my emotional checkbook is empty. Part of it is how I look at the state of things and feel like the selfish, the cruel, the violent….the monsters are winning.

Another mass shooting, and the exact same people who screamed that the perp in the Halloween attack in NYC needed to be shipped to Gitmo, and we needed to bar anyone from coming to the US minutes after that happened are the ones saying it’s too soon to say ANYTHING after yet another mass shooting with an AR-15.

Yeah, I say all the time that a lot of life is how you look at it and back when I decided to change my mindset, I said that I was going to do that. Some days it’s easy.  Some, it’s not.  Some days I have no problem with thinking the best of people and knowing that I have people in my life who care for me.  That the things I do to make things a little better than I left them is working.

Some days, though, some days it’s hard.

Some days, I’ll say that it’s just a ride, that we can change the world, that people can eventually be their best selves.

Some days, I just say in my head “I give up.” And there’s no one close to me in my life to talk me out of it.

So. Today?

I give up.

I’ll go to work.  I’ll write.  I’ll be kind to the people who cross my path.  Anything else?

I give up.  Life may just be a ride, but I’m tired of people turning the lights out on it.

I give up.

 

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Posted in Personal, Politics
11 Oct 2017

Dear person who made my burrito last night

I’m sorry I didn’t recognize you as someone I used to work with at the group home. There are a few reasons why:

1) The turnover is so high, I don’t bother to get to know people’s names until they have worked there six months.

2) The work outfit you wear now is probably different than what you wore at the group home. And I know you didn’t make meals there when I worked because people always assume I will do it.

3) You’re kind of a generic white girl. Get a gimmick of some kind like a memorable nickname, a facial tattoo or an interesting affectation like saying “Howdy” or “Comin’ at ya!”

4) I’m not very damn observant.

5) I have worked with a few hundred people over the last 30 years, and the only ones who stick out at the ones who made work harder or were my supervisor, so since you were neither, that’s a good thing.

6) You were complaining about the pay at the group home, which is about $5 an hour more than you make making my burrito. Um…I’m taking it that math was a hard subject for you in school.

7) You messed up my foster daughter’s burrito and put queso on it right after she said no queso. Sorry, but I don’t feel bad about not remembering you because of that.

8) I HAVE IMPORTANT THINGS TO REMEMBER! Like how Roy Thomas wrote Amazing Spider-Man from issue 101 – 104 and NO other issues, when Roy Normally took over from Stan Lee when he left a comic in the 70’s. Did Roy dislike writing Spider-Man as a character? ANSWER ME??!!??

9) Again, you’re kinda generic. Sorry.

10) I was so overwhelmed with hunger, I didn’t see you as a person, but as a burrito delivery system and for that I am sorry. Now give me my burrito and let me go eat, all right? Geez!

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Posted in Uncategorized
10 Oct 2017

Mental Health Awareness Day

Some days are easy.  You wake up refreshed and ready for the day.  Maybe you have a busy day at work where you do the things you enjoy about the job, and your co-workers are in good moods.  The day moves quickly, you are surprised by a little thing like having time to enjoy your lunch, a positive e-mail or someone wanting to meet you after work for something fun. 

Those days, being a positive influence, thinking the best of people, and enjoying where you are is effortless.  You have no problem holding the door for a stranger, leaving a big tip or helping out a coworker with a difficult task.  It’s almost effortless and you feel happy to be a part of the world around you.

Not every day is like that.

Some days you wake you feeling as if what you do has been a waste of time.  Your job is, at best, a treadmill where no matter what you do, you are not getting anywhere.  You’re overwhelmed, tired, lonely, and feel as if no matter what you do, things aren’t going to get any better.  There’s a reason the movie “Groundhog’s Day” is still popular, because we all get that feeling of going through the day and doing the same things over and over again.

There doesn’t have to be a reason for it.  Maybe it’s an anniversary of something crappy that happened to you, or one that used to be happy that now reminds you of when things were better.  Maybe it’s an e-mail from a boss or colleague first thing in the morning about something you messed up, or something you need to fix.  Maybe someone you wanted to hear from has blown you off and you feel like you did something wrong.  Maybe you have to deal with the unpleasant parts of your job, life isn’t going the way you wanted or…   

…you just woke up and don’t feel good about things. 

Those are the days it’s harder to feel like helping people or even putting up with them.  When I have those days, not only do I not want to help people, I don’t want people around.  It’s a terrible trick my brane plays on me:  I’m lonely, so to hell with people, I don’t want ANYONE to be around me.  Or, if my anxiety hits, it feels like everything is about to fall apart, and my fight or flight response goes into overdrive, making me feel as if everything in my life is a house of cards and will collapse with the slightest breeze.

That person who didn’t get back to you?  They really don’t like you and only put up with you to be polite, in fact most everyone just puts up with you because they HAVE to.  That job you have?  You’re going to be let go.  The car?  It will break down and make it so you can’t get to work AND cost more money than you have to fix. And so on, and so on, ad infinitum. 

I knew someone who had serious narcissism issues, and when they would be stressed, they would demand constant praise and attention.  The people in their life were not thought of as actual human beings with lives and emotions of their own, but props in their life to do what they were manipulated into doing.  As hard as it was for those people, it was just as hard for the narcissist, who had a deep hole in their soul they could never fill. And dude, the fact that I understood that helped for a very long time, and allowed me to put with a lot of behaviors that, looking back, were pretty damn rough.

Mental health is usually thought of in terms of the Big Things.  The addict.  The person unable to conform to society.  The person needing hospitalization.  But there are a lot of people who just struggle to make it day to day, and while they look like they are doing great, are just holding on by their fingertips. 

For my anxiety to hit last night it just took a single tweet that stated something like “It’s not that nice guys don’t get the girl, it’s that you aren’t a nice guy.” It wasn’t aimed at me, it was about the whole “nice guy whining about the friend zone” thing….  However, since it’s been a long time since my last relationship, it hit me differently.  I saw it as:  Well, that proves it.  I must be a screwed up abusive jerk who deserves to be alone.

Not exactly a normal, healthy response. I try pretty hard to keep the anxiety from taking over, but some days, man, some days I am Wile E. Coyote barely hanging on at the edge of the cliff and the Road Runner startles me.

That’s why we need to be aware of mental illness, and understand that it’s not something to hide or be ashamed of.

Or.

They are right and I deserve to be alone.

#MentalHealthAwarenessDay

 

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Posted in Personal
28 Sep 2017

That’s How I Got To Memphis

If you love somebody enough you’ll follow wherever they go

That’s how I got to Memphis, that’s how I got to Memphis

If you love somebody enough you’ll go where your heart wants to go

That’s how I got to Memphis, that’s how I got to Memphis

-Tom T. Hall

 

In the TV series “The Newsroom”, the final episode uses this song as a storytelling device, with the lead character explaining that’s it’s not Memphis being talked about, but where ever you are. How did you get here.

I think a lot of about that in my life. How did I get to Minneapolis? How did I start working in social services? How did I start doing podcasts? How did I become a father? How did I become this person’s friend?

Life is a series of choices, some are presented dramatically, some just sort of happen because you go along with the flow. My move to Minnesota was one where I was with a woman and we were presented with the opportunity to move here. I visited a city I had never thought of going to in order meet someone I had started a relationship on-line for love. I have taken a few trips for love, and while I profoundly regret the first one, I feel the others were important choices.

I started work in social services because of the people I knew in high school who needed help and none was available to them. Eventually, I tapped out on working with teenagers, and now I work with developmentally disabled adults because I believe all we have is each other, and we need to take care of each other.

I got into podcasting because it was a new way to tell stories, and because my closest friend was working a travelling job, and it was a way for us to keep in touch and keep the friendship growing. The people I have on the show I do with Joe are people I feel close to and want to share that friendship with. Most of the time, it’s reciprocated. Most of the time.

Would I move for love? Sure. What I do, I can do anywhere with an internet connection and people who need help. Would I change my life for love? Of course. I’ve done it before. I have changed my future, given myself over to someone, opened my home to those I love, and helped people change their lives because I loved them. Even if they are gone, that’s a choice I made and it’s how I got here.

I suppose you could also say that everything we do makes us what we are.

How did YOU get to where you are now? Did you do it for love? Did you do it because it seemed right at the time? Did you just wander into it and have no reason to change? I hope that you did it because you wanted to get to Memphis. Metaphorically, of course, if we all lived there, I don’t think the sewer system could handle it. Life is fleeting and some doors are closed when you walk through them, but I hope that you get to where you wish to go, and that it’s far, far better than you had imagined.

Much love to friends old and new. Thank you for your precious time. Please forgive me if I start to cry. (Yeah, that’s in the song as well. Go listen to it, you’ll thank me.)

That’s how I got to Minneapolis. A single comics podcaster with two jobs, one biological child and one who showed up later, working in an office by day and with DD adults at night and weekends, and someone who followed where his heart wanted to go.

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Posted in Personal
28 Sep 2017

What do we owe each other

I wrote a long essay on the current health care bill and how it’s being sold to us. I dug into why it’s a bad idea, how it will further drive Americans into the haves and have nots, and how it shoves more of the burden of the cost of being a civilized society onto the working and corporate serf class.  I edited it, filled it with clever asides and the personal experiences of people I know and love.

Then.

I deleted it.

No one who reads it will change their mind about anything involved. Every election cycle, we’re told by the polls that Americans want the health care system in America fixed, and anyone who tries anything to do so is ripped apart and may as well go into hiding.

I keep thinking about the phrase “What we owe each other.”

The minute I write that phrase, I hear people, mostly Americans (and mostly a specific privileged subset of Americans) say “Nothing.”

I don’t believe that. I just don’t.  Human beings are a species that is social.  The quickest way to break a person is to remove human contact.  The punishment that narcissists and abusers favor is to remove their victim’s social network (I know, I’ve had people attempt it before).  Our young are unable to care for themselves for years, meaning that we need to parent our young for years, unlike horses, turtles, fish, etc…  That means we have to have tribes, families, cultures and civilizations.

However, there is a growing strain of so-called “individualists” who feel that it’s OK to take without giving. That aggression is to be worshipped.  That ripping people off, exploiting them, and leaving them with nothing is just the way of the world.  They argue we need to remove protections for those who don’t have power because, well, everyone should be able to succeed on their own through rugged individualism.

What about those who are developmentally disabled? What about those whose talents aren’t suited for cutthroat capitalism?  What about those who don’t have the family and intergenerational supports that more successful people do?  What about those who do the necessary, but undervalued jobs that have to be done for our cities and societies to function?

Are they lesser beings? Are they to be left behind in the rat race?

“Those who do not work, do not eat” is tossed around by these folks, and for some reason, we don’t see this mindset as evil.

What DO we owe each other?

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Posted in Personal, Politics
19 Sep 2017

What I am thinking about today:

  • I am learning that there is a danger sleeping in my own bed. I don’t want to get out of it.  This is not a problem when I sleep on the couch at my part-time job.
  • Trump wants to have a military parade like they have in North Korea and used to have in Soviet Russia. Which doesn’t surprise me at all.
  • I spent $40 at Aldi for groceries last night and now am set for the winter.
  • Anyone who says things can’t make you happy obviously hasn’t owned a really good book.
  • I still don’t know if I want to keep the beard.
  • If you take peanut butter filled pretzels and dip them in cheese, you can actually hear your arteries hardening.
  • Sal Buscema doesn’t get enough love from comics fans.
  • I like highlighting people who seem to be forgotten by comics fandom because most people will respond with “Oh yeah, I love their work!”
  • Remember, the comic I like the least, I STILL like better that the comic you like the most.
  • I read something recently that enlightenment is simply being happy with who you are, where you are and your situation at that moment.  You can read all of the philosophy and self-help books in the world, meditate for hours a day, join discussion groups and all the like, but in the end, it’s being happy with what exist in that moment.  Find a way to do that every day, and you’re streets ahead of most people.
  • Yes, streets ahead is a “Community” reference.  You’re welcome.
  • I usually undercut my deep, philosophical points with a joke because I worry people will think I’m pretentious.  I won’t do that here, but if you like, I know a 15 minute version of “The Aristocrats” I’d be more than happy to tell you.
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Posted in Personal, Writing
13 Sep 2017

What year is it?

Twin Peaks: The Return, is over.

A show I never thought I’d get to see ran for 18 episodes, and as part of his deal, David Lynch demanded no interference from the network and got it. The first episode drew around 300,000 viewers when it aired, but Showtime stated that it was viewed over two million times on various platforms, and had a huge jump in their subscription service.  Lynch himself said to watch it like an 18 hour movie, and while I didn’t do that, I did do a few binges and liked it much better that way that watching an hour a week.

It was confounding, vague, impressionistic, weird, funny, goofy, horrifying and in some scenes, the darkest and most disturbing thing I have ever seen.

It was exactly what I needed without knowing it was what I wanted.

AND I am not going to get all snobby about it and say “You didn’t understand it” in a snide, condescending tone. It was not meant to be easily understood, challenged the viewer and made no apologies about that.  You bought in and decided to play in Lynch and Mark Frost’s nightmare or didn’t.  It wasn’t weird for weirdness’s sake, it was how David Lynch tells a story now.  Dreamlike, without answers and leaving much of the connective tissue up to you to put it together.

One of the great things about the series is that I have read multiple summations of the last episode. They all have very different interpretations of the ending, and, in my mind, they are all correct.  It was a sad ending.  It was a terrifying ending.  It was a satisfying ending.  It left a huge cliffhanger. It wrapped everything up.

Every one of those observations is valid. I have my own interpretation, but think about it:  What was the last piece of mainstream entertainment that allowed for ambiguity?  Where everything wasn’t tied up, explained and given to the audience prepackaged and easily summarized for Wikipedia?

If there is only the book in October and then Twin Peaks goes away forever, I am fine with that. If Lynch and Frost revisit that world, I am fine with that too.  In a time of Tentpoles instead of movies, I like that there are still people out there exploring how to tell a story and being afraid to make the audience work.

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Posted in Media

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