The Glass Ceiling

We were just talking and my co-worker is outraged that Tennessee schools can now teach creationism in science class and legally hate on Muslims and all the things that are going on in the state legislature this session and I said to her that I don’t really find it angry-making. What I find it is, for me, anyway, is sad.

Rather than sit down with Tennesseans and say “The old jobs are gone and they aren’t coming back and there aren’t going to be enough new jobs to go around, so if we want to compete as a state, we’ve got to be the brightest, most tolerant, most accommodating motherfuckers in the land,” we’re instead saying “Oh, sure, you can hate on gays and Muslims and women and teach what you think are Biblical truths all throughout your public school systems” to a bunch of Tennesseans. We’re basically saying, “Y’all go stand under this glass ceiling! Have fun. You can have every shitty thing you want, but we’re just neglecting to tell you that winning on every shitty thing means you never get to rise up high enough to get the good stuff.”

And that sucks. And I love you, Tennessee, so I know you’ll sit under your glass ceiling and convince yourself that you want to be there and that it’s better there than it is where the people who shooed you over under it live.

But I wish that weren’t so.

Do Other People Fight With their Dogs?

I’m having a huge fight with Mrs. Wigglebottom, but I feel kind of stupid about it, because, though she’s clearly sullen, I know she doesn’t get what the problem is.

But it pisses me off that, no matter how good she is when it’s just us here, no matter how well she listens, how predictably she behaves, whenever she gets a bug up her butt to do what she wants, that’s what she does. Yesterday, she ran over to the neighbors’ and ignored me as I yelled at her to stop and then, when I went and got her, she went trotting after the Butcher like “Oh, man, I’m having this great adventure and making B. angry! It’s awesome.”

And the worst part is that she looks so damn guileless and happy, like being able to run around while some angry woman chases after you hollering things you aren’t paying any attention to is just the best damn thing in the world.

Eh, who knows? Maybe it is.

And, sadly, this is the same damn fight we’ve had her whole life.