View from Patricia's front window

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Christmas memories, vol. 20

It's that time of year again. Time for you to learn more about how I ended up this way, how I've spent my Christmases lo, these last forty-odd years. This year I expect we'll have some sad ones - it's my first year with both my parents gone, and it's bound to make me kind of melancholy. Heck, I just started crying by the flatbread at Whole Foods because I used to buy it and bring it to my mom as a treat. But the thing is, the reason I miss my folks so much is because my life is filled with happy memories. They were people worth missing. I'm sitting in public right now, so I think we'll start off with something kind of innocuous. Public tearing-up garners worried glances, and I don't want to stress out that nice man at the next table who's selling Comcast subscriptions to unsuspecting callers who think he's in an office somewhere. (SECOND time I've see one of these guys out in a public place - last time it was in the waiting room at the tir...
Read more

Sharing the ceremony

Note - this is a very long post...it took 25 minutes to actually read aloud, but since some of you might be interested I'm posting it. The Transcript of the Official Wedding Ceremony of Poor George and Coaster Punchman I’d like to welcome everyone to this beautiful setting today to witness and celebrate the marriage of two spectacular people, Poor George and Coaster Punchman. Some of you know me and to others I’m a new face – my name is Melinda June, and I’m a close friend of the happy couple. I’m incredibly honored and a little overwhelmed that they’ve asked me to perform this ceremony. And I apologize in advance that I’m going to read this whole thing…it’s very important to me that I get this right, and since we couldn’t get a teleprompter this is the only recourse. As is obvious by the number of you gathered here today, I’m not the only person in this world who adores these two men.Therefore, when they asked me to prepare the ceremony and vows, I decided to enlist the help of th...
Read more

Empathize this

I've got two things on my mind today. First off, I really like Sonja Sotomayor. And I especially like that when discussing his selection criteria for Justice Souter's replacement, President Obama brought up empathy. Empathy is not the same thing as sympathy, compassion or emotion. Empathy is perspective. The idea that our laws have strict, specific definitions that should be considered without perspective is ridiculous. Laws mean something, but they must also be considered in context. That isn't to say they should be applied arbitrarily, or to advocate making exceptions left and right to suit a judge's whim...suggesting laws should be considered in context simply means that the courts must consider how our laws should be interpreted, and how they can make our society a better, more habitable, more functional one. How they can help Americans live their lives without impediment to their personal liberties. Empathy provides the perspective necessary to do this. Judge So...
Read more