metaphortunate | hi guys!

Umm, long time no talk. What's been going on….

I have had almost one whole glass of wine so I am pretty drunk! It is sad as shit what being pregnant for nine months and then nursing for sixteen months will do to your alcohol tolerance.

Incidentally, 13 or 14 months was about when I stopped being comfortable nursing in public in terms of feeling judged for nursing a kid that old. Not sure why. Maybe because he's started walking.

Before I had a kid I had Opinions on how old was too old to be nursing. Like, I thought, if the kid was old enough to speak up and ask to nurse, it was too old. Now my educated, considered, and strongly held opinion is that it's none of my god damned business how or whether anybody else's kid nurses. They know what's going on with them; I don't. I have enough to do just figuring out what my own kid needs.

Speaking of which, I stayed up too late last night reading Love Me, Feed Me: The Adoptive Parent's Guide to Ending the Worry About Weight, Picky Eating, Power Struggles and More, which I got because of a recommendation from The Fat Nutritionist on Twitter. It's theoretically aimed at adoptive parents, but has a lot to say that is relevant to anyone who's feeding a kid. Perhaps especially anyone who has food issues of their own, although, do I know any adults who don't have food issues of their own? Anyway, I found it a can't-put-it-down page-turner.

I have been thinking a lot lately about letting go of things I can't control. My baby goes to daycare. He's come home making signs that I don't know. He's learning things that we haven't taught him. It's weird. Really weird. I have to let it go. He's going to learn things I don't teach him, maybe even things I don't want him to know, or not to know at a given time - biting, for example, which we have already gotten a note about an incident of - and that's probably even a good thing. No parent, not even the best-intentioned, should be in complete control of everything their kid learns. I have to let it go.

There are people I really like whom I am coming to terms with the fact that they just don't like me as much as I like them. Not that they don't like me, I think? But you know how it is. There are people you like and you want to see more often… and there are people you like, and you see them maybe once every year or two, and that is just fine by you. And I am that person to some people. And that's okay. I have to let it go.

I've been having a lot of anxiety lately… not just about the election, but Lord knows, it doesn't help. And I'm trying to get better about curating my own news reading. I don't need to click on every "read this to be outraged! If you're not outraged, you're not paying attention!" link my friends retweet about horrible things happening in Naperville, or in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. There is not one goddamn thing I can do for women in the Congo. Seriously. Not one thing. To be anxious about them is a narcissistic, masochistic indulgence that does not help them at all. I don't need to pay attention to things I can't affect or help in any way. In fact I specifically need to not do it, because, because it eats up energy I could be spending on things I actually can affect. Attention is the currency of the day. The things I can't afford to spend it on: I have to let them go.

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Your alcohol tolerance sounds a lot like mine - I go from utterly sober to passed-out drunk in one buttery nipple, heh. Complete teetotaler, me.

I don't need to pay attention to things I can't affect or help in any way. In fact I specifically need to not do it, because, because it eats up energy I could be spending on things I actually can affect. Attention is the currency of the day. The things I can't afford to spend it on: I have to let them go.

Also, this is hitting so close right now, you don't even know. I'm conflicted because I don't want to be apathetic, but I also just do not have the reserves to give all these fucks. I have to find a way to be in the world, imperfect as it is, that does not require me to spend my days in a perpetual haze of seething self-righteousness, anger and frustration.

If it was effective, maybe I would convince myself that it was even my duty? To be ~informed~, y'know? Except it isn't. I can convince myself that everything is so horrible that it's not even worth trying to do anything about it. Or that the things I can affect are so small as not to be worth it. So it's counterproductive. If I want to do right, I have to make sure I channel my small store of power into the things I can affect, and part of that mean, yeah, ignoring to some degree the things I can't.

FWIW, if you wete thinking I'm one of those people, it's not true. I love you tons and want to see you more often! We could even share a single glass of wine and each get a light buzz. I am that cheap of a date.

There is, actually, something you can do for women in the DRC: you can donate to Global Fund for Women. Our grants go directly to women's groups in the Congo and elsewhere who are working to prevent violence and create genuine security in their communities.

Of course, if you can't spare the cash, that's understandable. And I can't argue with filtering the info you take in -- it's the only way to survive nowadays. I do the same thing. But sometimes there really is something you can do.

Well, I do actually! I have given to GFW in the past and will again in the future. But sometimes it feels like such a small thing. :/

Also, yay. :) I like having seen you recently and will check my calendar, we should totally get together for a glass of wine soon.

I know what you mean. It always seems like a drop in the bucket: the problems are huge, our work is never enough. But it does help. A small amount of money goes pretty far in the DRC.

Yay, seeing more of you!

I don't need to click on every "read this to be outraged! If you're not outraged, you're not paying attention!" link my friends retweet about horrible things happening in Naperville, or in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. There is not one goddamn thing I can do for women in the Congo. Seriously. Not one thing. To be anxious about them is a narcissistic, masochistic indulgence that does not help them at all. I don't need to pay attention to things I can't affect or help in any way. In fact I specifically need to not do it, because, because it eats up energy I could be spending on things I actually can affect. Attention is the currency of the day. The things I can't afford to spend it on: I have to let them go.

Yes.

I have been thinking a lot lately about the saying "it's amazing how much mature wisdom resembles being old and tired". Because boy am I old and tired.

Letting stuff go is really hard. But being continually exhausted helps.

Yeah, it's kind of the equivalent of not having to budget because you literally do not have enough cash or credit to buy anything!

Letting things go is haaaaard. < /whine>

There are people I really like whom I am coming to terms with the fact that they just don't like me as much as I like them.

I hate that. I hate it so much, on both ends, but yeah, attention is currency. And I can't be the top of everyone's priority list. Obama never answers my calls anymore for example. :(

Yes! It's hard! I struggle.

Attention is currency, but lack of attention does not necessarily equal lack of affection or lack of importance. There are so many factors ...

No, and that's part of what I'm trying to keep in mind: if I pay less attention to voter disenfranchisement in Florida, it's not because I don't care.

Right. If it were possible to do everything, it would be worth trying to do. Instead, we need to bloom where we're planted, make our local sphere as awesome as we can make it, spread that love and effectiveness outward by making the people on the edges of our local sphere more empowered to do the same, and so on and so on. This is the closest thing I have to a religion.

(Oh, and while I'm pretty sure you weren't fishing for strokes, when anyone in my family finds out we're going to see you, it instantly makes us happy. You're one of our (and by our, I mean my and my partners') favorite people in the world, though we see you almost never.)

And it's a really good way to think about it. Also, you're right that I wasn't fishing for strokes, but it's always good to hear that people I like a lot like me back. :)

Big sympathy wince at the asymmetry of liking/prioritizing. It stings, but it's how shit goes. I try to remind myself to be grateful for whatever goodness I get in a day, because usually it's a big damn lot, even if might not be exactly what I would wish for. And not because I think you're fishing for compliments, but just because I'm effusive, I think you're fantastic, I like you so much, and I wish I could see more of you!

Doing a small thing that is demonstrably helping matters. I totally feel you on the attention and outrage problem. I'm a professional feminist, and I get asked stuff by group members, relatives, sometimes media, and I just can't be an expert on all the ways that the world sucks for women. There's just too much. Also, I would probably just be a gibbering mess, sitting on the floor of my living room, rocking back and forth and crying. So I try to stick to my stuff and do my best at that, listen to the people I know who know about other things I care about but have minimal attention for when they tell me there's something I can do, and, when I can, set up ways to help that happen without me.

For example, I set up an automatic monthly donation to Partners in Health for their work in Haiti; they charge what is, to me, a small amount of money to my debit card every month, and that money goes pretty far in Haiti. For bonus goodness, nonprofits LOVE recurring donations because they are a predictable revenue stream, so I get to feel helpful on that score, too. I have taken worrying about Haiti off my mental ledger, and once a year I get a statement from PIH saying here's what we did with y'all's money, and I say hooray and show my partner and we feel lucky that we get to help make things suck a little less. It works out splendidly.

There's also a trust piece of this: I know so many people who do so many amazing things to make the world better, and I've read about so many more, and there are many more whose names I will never know who also do badass things based on knowledge and expertise I will never have, and I need to trust them to do that. I know that I am a control freak and that, because of the crazy I grew up in, I do have a baseline assumption that unless I do a thing, it will not happen. Okay, well, most people, it turns out, are not like my parents, and they don't need me to do their stuff for them. They're doing it just fine. YMMV, obviously, but this is a thing that goes on in my head, so I just thought I'd throw it out there.

Hey, thanks for taking the time to write all this out. It's totally true, and it totally helps!

hi guys!

Howdy!

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