This post is happening for a reason.

Stand ye warned. This is a rant. It is not going to be eloquent, it is not going to be structured, it is not going to be overtly rational. It is pure, unrestrained, fuck your excuses.

"Everything happens for a reason" <---- THE biggest cop-out of the species. Be more sensitive, say that you honestly don't know what to say or that you don't have words. It. is. NOT. comforting. If someone tried to "justify" most of these situations being caused by a person, the person would be called a psychopath and locked away or killed, and the one making the excuses would be institutionalized.

NO ONE should have the last remaining tatters of their pride stripped from them, be hand-bathed and spoon fed as an infant for three days with their face melted and every labored breath causing them agony because of scorched windpipes before passing. NO ONE should be born only to be crippled in their first few weeks of life by a FEVER and have all the "could have been"s stripped away without ever seeing them- to build SOME semblance of progress and then be told that it was for nothing- the condition has worsened and there is NOTHING that can be done. NO ONE should lose all sense of who they are or what's gone on around them and either be tortured with re-learning that their child died before them or torture their families with asking how they are. NO ONE should die alone as a Jane Doe, their family torn in two locations with critical injuries unable to locate their family. NO ONE should fear not being able to seek justice for their family, that a monster might walk free while their family lives with the impact of their choices for the rest of their lives. NO ONE should have to watch their beloved waste away and die, be hospitalized themselves and come home to find that some unswallowed load robbed them of their precious memories because they heard that the pair were en-route to the hospital over a police scanner. NO ONE should have to bury their child, or worse yet be left with nothing but an empty casket.

It does NOT all happen for a reason- there IS no reasoning for it! It's sadistic, it's torture. And if there IS something grand and omnipotent behind it they are no god- they are simply playing with a magnifying glass and delighting in the suffering they cause. It is meaningless chaos.

If such a being does exist and is reading this- FUCK YOU.

~Night Rose

I'm the only one allowed to kick that much ass Gamora.

     The other half and I went to see Guardians of the Galaxy last night...

     IT WAS ABSOLUTELY MIND-BLOWING. Great balance of humor, action, skirted romance, mystery, misery and of course, Groot. The jokes made me literally laugh out loud, the pain made me cringe. The battles had me at the edge of my seat and the drama tore the beating heart out of my chest and ate it.

     Pretty much Guardians of the Galaxy was everything it needed to be to truly do the universe justice. Several other Hero movies have attempted, a few have done above average. Guardians of the Galaxy nailed it, plated it in gold and put it on its ample trophy shelf. Hands-down the best movie I've seen in a long time.

     SO MANY SPOILERS I COULD SHARE. But I'm trying to do the right thing and not ruin it. Go, watch it for yourself. Take in the epic fullness that movie theaters have been cheating us out of for so damn long. If you can, find it in 3D. But watch it. You will not be sorry.

We can all be heroes like Kevin Bacon.
~Night Rose

Throw me a fricken bone here Scott!

     So one of my first realizations going into this I Am That Girl project was that I needed to stop procrastinating.

     ...Obviously I have a lot of work to do. :-D


     But, in all seriousness it is one of my major hangups. I have a million-plus things I could be doing at any given point. The chance that I'm going to settle on the one I really SHOULD be doing? Not very high. I get restless extremely easily, and tend to flit from medium to medium (typically mid-project leaving a LOT of un-finished Rose-isms... oooh pie!)

     I really am terrible. I'm not going to say I per-say admit it... more like I own it. But, the first step is realizing that there's a situation to begin with right?

     You see what I did there yet? Feel free to discover your own. I'm not here to tell you who to be, or HOW to be. That's your job. I'm just here to share my own adventure.



Hurry up and grab yours by the ponytail.

~Night Rose

Civic Responsibility Follow-up

      For anyone new to The Garden, a little while back I got a bit frustrated with a political situation that was at the time developing in our country. There had been an enormous number of "illegal immigrant" children dumped at our south western border. In an effort to alleviate the strain on that area, they were being relocated (temporarily, as I found out today) to other locations around the country. Unfortunately, some of our civilians (I use the "civil" part very loosely) thought in some redneck manner it was reasonable to repel this "invasion"- with guns. As a mother of two myself, the idea of those children having no place to go tears at me, especially when we have so many willing to pay exorbitant fees to adopt from overseas. Therefore, the idea that they were greeted by an armed you're not welcome here party  REALLY pissed me off. So, I did what I could and wrote a letter. I then blogged my irritation and several drafts of the letter showing my efforts to condense it to the White House contact form character criteria while retaining its tone and message.The entry date is 7/16 and can be found here.

     Today, I received the following response:

    
     I'm not going to lie, when I first saw that I had a response in my inbox (ESPECIALLY the day before my 25th birthday) I was stoked. I wrote that letter two months ago, I can't believe they actually thought enough to write back!
    
     And then I read their letter, which enlightened me that obviously they didn't have the courtesy to more than skim mine.

     Dude are you serious?! I actually sat down and composed, not simply wrote, composed a letter. Then I butchered it to shit and STILL managed to keep the purpose- I made a meme for the sake of cheese! And what I get is a generic form-styled response. It lent a very broad-spectrum response, a finger point, and a closure. Very disappointed Uncle Sam.

As another stone silenced in the pond-
Night Rose

I swear I'm not a "Social Warrior"

     Now that you are crying bullshit and calling me Pinocchio allow me to clarify that title: I am not what the wonderful internetz have deemed a "Social Justice Warrior". A "Social Justice Warrior" is, as defined by the Urban Dictionary:

Social Justice Warrior:

A pejorative term for an individual who repeatedly and vehemently engages in arguments on social justice on the Internet, often in a shallow or not well-thought-out way, for the purpose of raising their own personal reputation. A social justice warrior, or SJW, does not necessarily strongly believe all that they say, or even care about the groups they are fighting on behalf of. They typically repeat points from whoever is the most popular blogger or commenter of the moment, hoping that they will "get SJ points" and become popular in return. They are very sure to adopt stances that are "correct" in their social circle.

The SJW's favorite activity of all is to dogpile. Their favorite websites to frequent are Livejournal and Tumblr. They do not have relevant favorite real-world places, because SJWs are primarily civil rights activists only online. 

   
     I'll be the first to admit- I do 99.9% of my activism online. I could list off a million excuses reasons for this but the primary ones are that I am selfish and lazy. However, if I bother to post about something you had better believe it's important to me. And unlike the SJW's, I don't give the pass of gas if people agree with me- on the contrary I prefer that they think for themselves. I despise sheep and think herd mentality to be the ultimate offense to human intelligence there is. Question your world, create your own opinions. Even if they aren't entirely perfect at least you're conscious enough to HAVE an opinion. Unfortunately, the majority of our peers are more content to take the road well-trodden and not risk the status quo. 

     Given the trend my recent posts have been on, and given the one pounding in my head for release seems determined to continue, I felt this was an important point to make. The topics I flare up about are extremely close to home- the state of our school systems for example. My aspirations in high school were cut short when my school was forced to cut courses and teachers- I couldn't use my art classes to earn scholarships because there WERE no art classes. Now, nearly a decade later my own children were put on waiting lists to get into school. My daughter just got the call today that she will start Kindergarten on Tuesday- nearly a month into the school year. My son still awaits placement for Pre-K, and it's likely they won't be able to find a place for him in the same school my daughter will be attending. 

     I could just bottle it up. I could sit by silently and let the world run its course. But it's just not me. While I am not a "Social Justice Warrior", I am an advocate. I advocate progress, I advocate awareness, I advocate social development. I support expression, and strongly encourage involvement in one's natural world. I cannot be satisfied with the status quo. Rather than just allowing issues to slip by I will be as the rock, forcing the stream to change its course or at the very least interrupting it. Complacency is killing our country and our culture and I am done participating in it.

Be less afraid of making a ripple with action than drowning because you chose to sit still.

~Night Rose

Quest for Passion

     One of the first things Alexis tells you to do in I Am That Girl to begin discovering your passion is to think about what REALLY pisses you off. It didn't take much thought at the moment as my children are waiting to find out what school (if any) they will be attending this year or if they will be put on a waiting list. Education has been a thorn in my side as long as I can remember- I came from a small-town school with cow pastures on all four sides. When I was in junior high, the state reduced funding and our proposed budget failed. As a result, our Art, Music, and Sports programs were cut along with Health and Home Economics. I was an art-centered student. I was devastated. All my strengths were cut in one go and with them any chance I had of getting a scholarship. Now as an adult my extremely bright, eager to learn children are playing hopscotch of being placed in one of two schools. One is bilingual and is at best mediocre, the other is in the heart of the ghetto and has the test scores to prove it. I do not want to see my children's spark snuffed so early but I don't have the time (or energy/resources) to home school my children.

     My children and Education are two of my passions. Writing is a third. Obviously I have more searching to do- but considering I had to hop out of my wonderfully warm bathtub to my frigid living room to get this out of my head and documented, I'd say we're off to a pretty good start.

Start a riot of your own.
~Night Rose

Stirring the Rose's brain kettle...

     I am in the beginnings of reading a book- I am not ashamed to say that it is meant to be a self-help/motivational book. It is about self identification and the finding of one's passion in life. For any who are curious, the book is I Am That Girl by Alexis Jones. And it has me questioning myself.

     Hang on, wait a second- Rose is QUESTIONING herself? The blunt, brassy, heart-on-her-sleeve, blogging-her-balls-to-the-world Rose is soul searching?! Over a chick-book?! Stop the press- we have an imposter.

     That's pretty much how I feel about it too- shocking for something I picked up off the clearance rack at work for $2 because I liked a bracelet line and had forgotten my current novel at home. But nevertheless it is the case. What am I passionate about? What truly stirs me to action? What are my boundaries? My values? Who is that girl in the mirror, and why does she always want something more?

     As of a little over a week from now, I will have walked through the life of that girl for twenty five years. Her roots are my own. I've known her friends, experienced her milestones, examined her decisions. I've mourned her pains and celebrated her blessings. Once or twice a wise blacksmith has tried to ask her the same questions this book is demanding now. But up till now, I've never really fought for any of the answers. I've dragged through the path I felt would be most acceptable- even when I hated every moment. I've had five years since high school to chase my dreams without really having any. It's very difficult to be satisfied when you don't know what you want in the first place.

     Well, twenty five years is enough. If I'm ever going to go beyond the scraping by I'm going to have to decide how I would best do that instead of seeking the first appealing job that grabs my bait. I am going to continue reading I Am That Girl, and invite anyone reading this to do the same and begin their journey with me. Claire's has long since clearanced them out, but they can be found on Amazon here. I will post as inspired while reading, and I hope at least some will take this journey with me. I'm done simply "doing", it's time to "be".


Fruitful journeys mes amis~
Night Rose

Exuses as Motivators

     Great motivational bracelet isn't it? "It is what it is", or "Relax, shit happens and it's out of your control" It seems like a really great message for a stressful day. One of my managers had a habit of saying it when we ran out of something, or when things went crazy or pretty much any difficult situation. She always shrugged her shoulders and had a very defeated (albeit defiant) expression on her face. You could tell she hated the situation but she really didn't see anything she could do about it so she let it go.

     She allowed herself be a victim."It is what it is" shows a defeatist frame of mind and insinuates that life has put you in a situation and you have no control or choices and allows you to deny responsibility for the outcome. Unless you are in a coma or otherwise debilitated and someone else holds the controls for your life, that is NEVER the case. As a manager, she could call people in. She could borrow or purchase supplies to get us through or post a notice about whatever we were out of. She could offer discounts. She HAD options. Allowing the situation to spiral out of control was a conscious decision. Life did not make a hopeless situation, she chose to relinquish control.

     I want a t-shirt that says "It is what you make it"- it's much more proactive. "It is what it is" is the mind frame of a victim. It's more of an excuse than a motivator. Seize fate by the horns. Take responsibility and make life what you want it to be.

     After all, it is what you MAKE it.

Night Rose's First Fullfillment of her Patriotic Responsibility as a Citizen of the United States.

 Original:
Forgive me if I ramble, this is my first contact with the White House since the term of Bill Clinton when I was in Elementary school, and I'm not overly familiar with etiquette. I was just reading articles about our own citizens taking up arms against the "minor immigrants" being housed in their community. Worse yet, I saw friends on my own feed liking this action. As an American, I took Government when I was in school, and unfortunately I have found that our citizens and many of our representatives have lost sight of what America means.

"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

I'm afraid that the term "minor immigrants" must have confused our citizens- for surely American citizens would never turn their back on a needy child. They must think these are some petty immigrants; criminals who have no place in their own society. America would never be so callous as to look in the faces of children and say that they do not belong here, and are the problem of "someone else". Unfortunately, The Statue of Liberty only watches our eastern coast while on our western border she seems blind to her charge. As an American daughter, mother, sister, citizen; I cannot believe that our people are so blinded. The United States of America was once the land of promise- an example of enlightenment and hope for the world. Now we bicker and squabble about petty religious differences, or party agendas. We were a role model to developing countries, and now we look like an elder sibling going through their rebellion phase. The United States MUST remember their heritage. We accepted a responsibility and paraded it before the eyes of all the unfortunates of the world- she carries her torch high and proudly still. But it seems her tablet has become a guest list- and if you are not on the list then you are no longer welcome. Enough with the squabbling. Free Lady Liberty. Allow her to pass from sea to sea. If America did not want such a charge then she should not have been welcomed. Yes, there will be difficulties. There is no easy solution to this issue. But dumping helpless children on someone else's door stoop so we no longer have to figure out this difficult puzzle is irresponsible. We do not deport immigrants who marry our citizens simply for their green card and then leave them, we should not do so now to innocents who have no where else to go. My thoughts will be heavy for the remainder of this standoff, I wish I could say my conscience was clear. For the decisions that are about to be made are on the head of all America's Citizens. Whether they could truly impact them or not.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After editing and being forced to cut 540 characters to meet 2500 character criteria:


Good evening, I was reading about our own citizens taking up arms against "minor immigrants" being sent to their state. I saw friends on my own feed liking this action. As an American, I took Government when I was in school and sadly have found that our people and many of our leaders have lost sight of what America means.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp! cries she with silent lips. Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
I'm afraid that the term "minor immigrants" must have confused our citizens for surely American citizens would never turn their backs on a child. They must think these are some petty illegals; vermin who have no place in their own society. America would never be so callous as to look in the faces of children and say that they do not belong here, and are the problem of "someone else". The Lady Liberty watches our east coast while on our western border she seems blind to her charge. As an American daughter, mother, sister, citizen; I cannot believe that our people are so blinded. The United States was once the land of promise- an example of enlightenment and hope for the world. Now we bicker and squabble about petty religious differences, or party agendas. We were a role model to developing countries, now we look like an elder sibling going through their rebellious phase. The United States MUST remember her heritage. We touted a responsibility before the eyes of all the world- she carries her torch high and proudly still. But it seems her tablet has become a guest list- and if you are not on the list then you are no longer welcome. Enough with the squabbling. Free Lady Liberty. Allow her to pass from sea to sea. If America did not want such a charge then she should not have been welcomed. Yes, there will be difficulties. There is no easy solution to this. But dumping helpless children on someone else's door stoop so we no longer have to figure out this puzzle is irresponsible. We do not deport immigrants who marry our citizens simply for their green card and then leave them. We should not do so now to innocents who have no where else to go. My thoughts will be heavy for the remainder of this debate, I wish I could say my conscience was clear. For the decisions that are about to be made are on the head of all America's Citizens; whether they can impact them or not.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Remember your duty my fellow citizens. It is a heady one that was granted to us by our forefathers. And as they shouldered it in our turn so should we. Otherwise the American People are diminished, and merely shadows of former grandeur. A country of immigrants united by liberty, brightly should our flame burn!

The pressure before the storm

     Here they were, it was the time. All the excitement and preparation of the past months came to this moment. The gravity of the evening weighed heavily on their shoulders. This could be the big break- they could at last receive recognition for all of their hard work. At least they might gain some new followers; people who would help encourage them to keep going and creating in the future. Just so long as they escaped embarrassment. Crowds could be harsh, and this was in every way a true battle. Sure, everyone was friendly back stage but when it came down to it they were all there for the same purpose- to win. The added exposure was great but they all wanted that prize.

      The band mates exchanged what they hoped were encouraging smiles as they readied to swap sets. All their gear was hand-me-down precious. A guitar from a favorite uncle, a drum kit that Dad had beaten the heart into in his early twenties when he was sure he was going to make it huge. And the mic, a school cast-away when outdated equipment had been replaced. The sentimental value hadn't mattered to the suits- how many speeches had their teachers inspired them with through that mic? Hell, the lead sung her first solo with it. Who cared if the gear wasn't top of the line, in every piece were hopes, dreams, and passion. They made the group feel at home wherever they were.

     "You're on in two minutes, have your stuff ready!" blurted out the head of a small middle-aged man with thinning hair and an overly large headset as it appeared around the corner and then returned to wherever it had been before. They all looked at each other one more time- they were clearly anxious never having played a venue so large before. But mixed into that anxiety was an exhilaration. How many groups never made it out of the garage? This was a huge step. Suddenly the atmosphere of the room changed. They were ready. Alone they were nervous and afraid of messing up; standing on the stage in front of everyone in the spotlight. But now they were one. No one of them was facing those sweaty lights of the stage alone, or the masses beyond them. Separately they flinched under the weight of it all; but together they carried a spark. And that spark was about to light the house on fire.

Go with love and find peace dearest lady.

                How to sum up the words and feelings that have lodged themselves tightly in my throat- you were love embodied Kathy. You scooped up so many people and helped us find our feet and worth, even if we could drive you crazy on occasion. For me, you were a second mother. For  over a decade through the silly squabbles Alex and I have had that really don't seem very important anymore and my foolishly stubborn teenage years you were there. You showed me the world and you weren't afraid to tell me when I was making bad decisions. Later, you were one of the first to grant my husband a chance when he turned himself around. Then when my children arrived, you immediately welcomed them into your adoptive family. It really put a smile on my face when my daughter called you Mom. I owe you so much, and I'm never going to be able to make my missteps right. In the hospital last night it was unreal when the news came. How can so bright a star be gone? Someone so vibrant and unique? Who am I going to call when I see an awesome deal on Starwars memorabilia or My Little Pony/Hello Kitty stuff? How did the world not end when you left? When I got the call I hoped and prayed it would be a waste of gas- that Sam and Gene would give me their exasperated looks and you would call me silly over getting so worried over a scrape. But you weren't there. I tried to fill in as I could, I swear I did Mom. I tried my best to keep Alex grounded, and give a few smiles or laughs where I could. I'm sure you would have done much better.

                But that was then, and this is now. And now the focus has to be on healing. So much damage occurred last night, I never got to visit Sam. And Gene still needs surgery for his arm. I love you Kathy, please keep my father company till my time comes. I know he loved your discussions. I promise you I will keep trying.