@courtcan@mastodon.social
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

courtcan

@courtcan@mastodon.social

#author & #bibliophile: #fantasy #scifi #specfic
Amerigerman cultural mutt, aka #ThirdCultureKid
#ADHD #DAVE #neurosparkly
leaning into discomfort
mischief
a/theist tarrying in the "slash"
critical thought viking
I'LL BE YOUR ACCOMPLICE
she/her
Abi '96

courtcan.com

profile pic: photo. me. white woman. 40s. chin-length dark blond curls w/ multi-colored streaks. gray t-shirt w/ black sleeves

header: from cover of my spec-fic collection MALEFACTORS: blonde woman & creepy glow-eyed figure in cowl

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

You are going to make love to a Cereal Mascot, who do you choose?

I'm going Snap, Crackle, & Pop.

courtcan,
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

@RickiTarr I was gonna be real ecumenical and select from multiple genders. But I can't. Because I've never seen any cereal mascots that aren't male. (Apparently Post has a new one, a female zombie? But I've never seen her.) And of course no nonbinary ones afaik.

So I guess Count Chocula and I are just gonna have to have a good time together by ourselves!

Alice, to random
@Alice@beige.party avatar

I like when people tell me they unfollowed me as if I’m a subscription service that's somehow losing money as a result.

courtcan,
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

@tantramar @Alice Recently this guy & I got into what I'll loosely define as "conversation" on here. We weren't even following each other. After about 6 exchanges (3ish from each of us), he huffily told me he was blocking me because he considered me to be a nihilist, and also because I defined the words "atheist" and "theist" differently from how he defined them.

Gif of little blond girl looking perplexed and slightly skeptical

RickiTarr, to random
@RickiTarr@beige.party avatar

So, what's the thing, what's the big thing no one can help you with? How do you cope with it?

courtcan,
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

@RickiTarr Anxiety-induced spiraling thoughts. I very quickly go from mild concern to imagining outright disaster. My mind plays out scenarios that end with my closest friends utterly rejecting me, my daughter assaulted or dead, my husband killed in a cycling accident, and and and.

I take my meds, I see my therapist (though I'm admittedly overdue), & I let my closest loved ones know when the spiral edges toward disaster.

But I'm alone inside my skull. No one else can make those thoughts stop.

courtcan, to church
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

Also pondering the #fundamentalist-leaning aspect of my #Christian upbringing.

When you take the lyrics "would he devote that Sacred Head for such a worm as I?" into your very core as a 5-year-old, it takes A LOT to get shut of that unsightly baggage as an adult.

Even "Amazing Grace": "...how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me...."

Really? I was a child. A baby.

A wretch?

Reprobate & miscreant are some of the synonyms. I was to learn those as well.

1/

#exvangelical
#church

courtcan,
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

Wretch: from Old English "wreċċa," meaning "outcast."
Wreċċa itself from a Proto-Germanic word that meant "fugitive."

Sure, I didn't know any of the , and it's not like that etymology or even the word "wretch" itself come up in everyday conversation.

But even though the ancient roots of our never enter our actual day-to-day lives, I do believe the sense of them remains somewhere in our collective subconscious. And some of those roots are rotten. And they fester.

2/

courtcan,
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

When you use music and targeted lessons to teach a little girl that she is continually observed by an omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, omnibenevolent being...
...and that she herself is a wretch, an outcast, a worm that can never even approach being good (Mark 10:18, Romans 3:23) much less being omnibenevolent...

...then what you have in her adulthood is a woman with a lack of self-worth so profound, it goes deeper than the cellular level.

She will believe wholly in her unworth.

3/

courtcan,
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

And all of your "but loves you and died for you!" protests to the contrary simply are not sufficient for countering the insidious, pernicious programming you installed in her Core Self during her most malleable, most vulnerable season of life.

Fundamentalism isn't limited to conservative religion.
Fundamentalism can rear its ugly head in any arena, any set of beliefs, any type of nonbelief-in-deity, any political identity, any life season.

And my experience certainly is not unique.
4/

courtcan,
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

I still struggle against a #fundamentalist mindset gifted to me in the cradle. I still struggle against the fundamental lack of #SelfWorth that underlies so much of who I am.

I am healthier than I was. #Meds...#therapy...loving support from people who give me #grace (grace = full acceptance; grace = accepting that you are accepted)...all have contributed to a measure of healing.

But I will likely struggle with these things in some form for the rest of my life.

And I think about...

5/

courtcan,
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

...the wider implications of my experience & of the fact that it is not unique to me.

There are so, so many of us.

And when those of us who critique Christianity & & church engage in our critiques, I think we underestimate the depth of the trauma that has damaged and is continuing to damage the people who remain caught up in Christianity, religion, church.

They are all walking around with raw, open, festering wounds that they deny deny deny so as to neither see nor feel them.
6/

courtcan,
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

None of this is to excuse how they go about being in this world.

None of this is to excuse how I sometimes still go about being in this world. None of this is to excuse my regressions, my poor word choices, my questionable thought patterns.

But it does explain.

None of us can do more than what we have the to do at any given time. When we acquire more and better tools, hopefully we will take more beneficial .

7/

courtcan,
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

Keeping ourselves open to the awful, aweful face of the Other is key.

It's the only way we will ever open to the Awful and Awful within our own selves.

There's more to this.

There always is.

And maybe I'll expand it in a blog post.sometime. But for now, gotta run.

Thanks for listening, y'all. ❤️🤘🖖

8/8

courtcan, to Women
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

Vaguely pondering the stellar supporting cast in #TimBurton's #SleepyHollow (1999):

Jeffrey Jones
Christopher Lee
Ian McDiarmid
Michael Gough
Ray Park
Peter Guinness
Martin Landau
Richard Griffiths

I've always loved the movie for its story, its #Gothic-ness, and its main cast. The story really could have used more #women in it, but still.

The men of this supporting cast really do deserve all the shout-outs. The film could not have been its #eerie, drama-laden best without them.

#film

Jaden3, to random
@Jaden3@mastodon.social avatar

As a lil kid sitting on my grampa porch in tupelo mississippi he telling me ' jaden you got work twice as hard as a these white kids to make it. Make sure you read , study and go college '.
Don't end yall life like me and your gramma serving these mfs.
Shit I didn't understand a word he said at the time I do now !!

courtcan,
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

@Jaden3 I'm sorry it's still like this after 500 years. It's wrong, it's stupid, it's evil, and it's infuriating. And I don't know how to make it stop.

KokopelliBFree, to Nikon German
@KokopelliBFree@ohai.social avatar
courtcan,
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

@KokopelliBFree

  1. Got to work on my new fantasy short story
  2. Got released from physical therapy for my back
  3. Started new family tradition of me reading aloud to us after supper 😊❤️


@3goodthings

courtcan, to random
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

I asked my 11yo daughter.

11yo: I'd say a bear. Because a man might be a tricky person. Bears aren't always dangerous, but tricky people are always dangerous.

She said the same if the stranger were a woman "unless she has kids with her."
We've taught her not about strangers but about "tricky people"--people who want to lure you into feeling safe with them so they can hurt you. And if she's in trouble in public, she's to look for a mom with kids before asking anyone else for help.

courtcan, to random
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

"The electorate doesn't want the truth, it wants answers in line with their thinking."

--CJ Cherryh,
THE VINDICATION (Cyteen, 3),
1988

Well, that certainly hasn't changed in 36 years. 😑

GrimmReality, to random
@GrimmReality@beige.party avatar

At the store a delightful looking worker smiled at me a little too long, like all shiny as if she'd just heard a great joke - which I realized later maybe was because I had one of my funny tees on - and I smiled awkwardly and nodded back but suppressed the words that came immediately to mind, which were "What's YOUR deal, happypants?" so I may have some issues of nonresocialization to work on.

courtcan,
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

@GrimmReality The other day, a store clerk complimented me on my shirt, which is green and emblazoned with the Loki quote "THIS IS ABSURD."

Me: Thanks! That's surprising, I really need to re-dye it!

I thought she was talking about my hair. facepalm

courtcan, to random
@courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

me logs on to Social Media

me: o mighty Social Media, please bestow upon me knowledge of the current state of affairs

Social Media: EXCEPT FOR THE ORANGUTAN THAT CREATED A MEDICATED PASTE, THE AFFAIRS SEEM TO MADE OF SHIT AND ARE ON FIRE

me nodding: that tracks

me logs off of Social Media

flexghost, to random
@flexghost@mastodon.social avatar

deleted_by_author

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  • courtcan,
    @courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

    @flexghost Apparently they also sang the Darth Vader theme at her as she walked across campus. 😆

    donni, to random
    @donni@mastodon.social avatar

    Life is thousands of normal and boring days, and then one day when you decide to wrestle an elephant

    courtcan,
    @courtcan@mastodon.social avatar
    WorkWithKirk, to random
    @WorkWithKirk@mstdn.social avatar

    Snow White and the Se7en Dwarves

    courtcan,
    @courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

    @WorkWithKirk I would watch this so hard.

    MLE_online, to random
    @MLE_online@social.afront.org avatar

    Some ladies keep their white sneakers so flawlessly white and clean.

    Do they buy a new pair as soon as one pair gets the slightest scuff or stain?

    Do they have ten pairs and rotate them to keep them from wearing out quickly?

    Do they spend a half hour each evening carefully cleaning and conditioning their shoes to remove the dirt of the day?

    courtcan,
    @courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

    @MLE_online Here in central Oklahoma, white shoes are an impossibility. The red dirt (port silt loam) gets on and in absolutely everything. I have a new pair of sneakers with light gray soles. I've worn them outside maybe three times. They're already getting a hint of red! 😫

    davepolaschek, to USpolitics
    @davepolaschek@writing.exchange avatar
    courtcan,
    @courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

    @davepolaschek IT IS FUCKING INSPIRATIONAL 😄🖖🤘

    GrimmReality, to random
    @GrimmReality@beige.party avatar

    Ah, Seinfeld being a multimillionaire pseud who will want for nothing until his dying day but remains ultraperturbed at time passing and people trying to make society less shitty - always sparkling material and maybe a sufficient prompt for me to do a shot-for-shot repost of my other-medium thread of his last and profoundly dogshit stand-up special/basic-as-fuck litmus test. I shall have a beer or two and mull this prospect.

    courtcan,
    @courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

    @GrimmReality @catsnfats Kramer was the only part of that show I enjoyed. His unhingedness spoke to me.

    Still does, tbh. 😆

    augieray, to random
    @augieray@mastodon.social avatar

    The casual dismissal of continuing risks drives me crazy. This chart notes that 2023 concert revenue "shatters records in Post-COVID comeback."

    Post-COVID?! In four months of 2023, over 21,000 people have died of COVID. That's more than the gun homicides in the US in ALL of 2023. Where is this "post-COVID" world everyone talks about?!

    https://www.statista.com/chart/32177/box-office-gross-of-the-global-top-100-music-tours/

    courtcan,
    @courtcan@mastodon.social avatar

    @augieray The "post-COVID" dwells in the non-reality dimension all of those people are living in.

    I don't get it.

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