Youth Gun Violence..Evil or Apathy, What is the Cause?

My sixy something, baby boomer Mother asked me (a forty something Gen Xer) the other day what I thought was the issue with kids and gun violence, what was the cause?  She is genuinely concerned and the national news frightens her. Truth is, it frightens me too. Is it an overtaking of evil in our society as the right wingers like to howl about, God's judgement on abortion and gay right? Or could it be simply, bad parenting? (Which of course is an evil in itself).

I personally lean towards the answer being neglectful parenting and a glorification of violence, not just in our media these days, but also from religious leaders, christian politicians and average, hardworking citizens that call for gun freedom above all else and endless war and conquest. Also, we as conscientious citizens of this great country, doing ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about the gun violence. No new laws getting passed, not even much conversation about it. What message are we sending the children of this nation? By this national sin of omission, we're telling them that they aren't worth the trouble of passing some laws that would keep assault weapons from being easily purchased and brought to schools for intended massacres. They can blame it on females getting abortions or LGBT partners getting legally hitched, but it's not any of those things. The problem is that good people are doing nothing. We are shouting loud and clear that the lives of school age children mean nothing. This in turn causes the children to devalue their lives and the lives of the people around them. I think it's a plausible answer. That mixed with parents that are more involved in their social (and social media) lives than being an involved parent.

Is evil overtaking the nation or is apathy? Every day that passes that we are not screaming for sane gun legislation, making phone calls, sending emails, protesting at our state capitols, doing everything that we can, then we perhaps are contributing to this deadly apathy epidemic.

Sane gun laws? It's a start. Giving a shit, it's a necessity.

Buh Bye Facebook?

Could it really be that after five and a half years of liking, sharing, posting and obsessively checking my newsfeed that I've finally grown weary of Facebook and their shenanigans? I'm a disgruntled FB page owner and user. FB has offered many wonders over the years.

For example:

• Finding people from my past (I think they borrowed that trick from Classmates.com)
• Reading about people's illnesses and trials
• Looking at pictures of food that other people eat
• Watching relationships form and fail
• Finding that special someone (Yes it does really happen)
• Observing grown ass people publicly bash their former spouses in front of their children on their public walls (then getting unfriended by aforementioned people when you tactfully point the fact out to them that it is wrong to do this in front of your children
• Meeting like minded individuals and enjoying their company until they completely flake out because you post something they don't like

The happy list goes on and on. For me, overall, Facebook has been a consuming beast. It steals my attention from projects and other areas of my life that need tending to. I find myself simultaneously drawn to and sickened by Facebook's magnetism.

I'm working on cutting back. I've done a hatchet job on my friends list, paring down from over 300 to just 100 and it's going to get one more cut before I'm done. I've kept mostly the people that I care about and/or really know on a personal level, those who I enjoy interacting with the most and then a small handful of people who I simply like to observe because they either amuse or horrify me with the crazy shit they post. My goal is to cut back to 2 hours a day and I plan to use a log to jot down my times in and a timer to remind me to get off. I eventually, maybe after the first of the year, plan to whittle it down to half an hour a day. I don't think I can ever leave (plenty of room at The Hotel California..), I have too many business related contacts, people that I care about in my grief group, and at least one page that directly affects my income, but I do believe that I can cut back to where Facebook has less of a pull in my life. I want to be more productive with everything I do, not just on Fb, but in the physical, outside world.

Concerning being a disgruntled FB page owner, I had around 18 active pages (some my creation and some I am an Admin on) at one point. I was a pageaholic. Two political pages, one grief page and affiliated group, my blog page that was meant to be the Facebook presence for this blog, a really kick ass Beatles page, about five or six more Beatles pages that I helped manage, an inspirational page, a progressive Christian page, a cat themed quote page and more. I've shut down and dropped off of most of the pages and intend to cut more. Working on figuring out right now which ones are the most important. Facebook has been hiding posts from hobby/inspirational/non-profit pages in an effort to get desperate page owners to pay to "boost" (pay to be seen) their posts.

My fellow page owners have sometimes tried paying to be seen and found it largely ineffective. Many pages have quit producing their wonderful material and are dropping like flies on Facebook. I am one of them. When you work for years to build a large audience and then Facebook holds your page hostage, allowing only 1-5 percent of your people to see your page, it gets frustrating. I, for one, will not pay to be seen, that's the general consensus among my fellow page owners. Currently, many of the people who do see page posts don't bother to hit the like button or share (which is how pages are seen and grow best organically).

I see Facebook trending towards lots of paid "sponsored" ads in the newsfeed and a very small percentage of hobby pages showing up unless you create a special newsfeed for them. So, this is the gist of what's going on with Facebook pages, like mine. We're just tired of trying to entertain, inform, inspire people and having Fb hide our attempts at this free service that many of us provide the FB masses. The diverse and unique content on the newsfeed was one of the elements that initially made Facebook so much fun. I would encourage anyone who likes FB to write to them, let them know you're not happy with what's going on. It's only going to get worse over time as more and more sponsored ads flood the newsfeeds of every user. Oh, and be sure to give your favorite pages some love, in the form of liking, commenting and sharing the things they post. Many pages on FB are a labor of love that someone takes their time to create content for, for free, for your enjoyment. Please let them know they are appreciated, so they don't lose interest like I did.

Sorry Facebook, it's looking like our love is growing cold. Greed is a huge turnoff and you're just not meeting my needs no matter what I do. It may be time to say buh-bye. :( 

Grief Comes in Waves

Grief is such a universal experience. It's a process, a journey through the dark night of the soul, through the valley of the shadow of death. Knowing the elements of grief empowers us for the journey.

Another Tragic Loss. Nanu Nanu.

Like the rest of the world today, I am still stunned and deeply saddened by the death of comedy great, Robin Williams. I met Mr. Williams when I was 8 years old, through our tv set, on the show Mork and Mindy. Like many other tv viewers of that era, it was instant love. His quirky, physical comedy on the show was endearing, other-worldly, yet so easy to relate to. It seems to me that he was my first introduction to comedy that I could relate to as a child. To this day, I still love the type of physical comedy that Robin was known for.

As I grew up, Robin Williams became more famous and successful, he seemed a permanent fixture in my life and in our culture and honestly, I didn't mind. I never realized he was 20 years older than me until yesterday. I always saw him as the big brother type, someone you would love to have in your family. I've heard it expressed by Beatles fans who feel the same way about the Fabs, they just felt like family, the big brothers you always wanted but never had.

Like many of his casual fans, I was not aware of Mr. Williams' struggles with depression and addiction. So many times, a happy face hides many sorrows. I am hopeful that this will raise mental health and suicide awareness in a way like never before. I pray that this senseless death has some positive outcome. Oh please, let there be something good come of it. Let people be more compassionate towards those who are depressed and can't seem to "pull themselves up by their bootstraps".

Thank you Robin Williams for your bright light that you shared for so many years. May we always remember the lessons you taught us. Shine on, lovely soul.

Photo via Sesame Street

Let There Be Peace

Please Imagine/send thoughts/prayers for peace tonight around the world. Peace among countries, peace in difficult situations, peace in homes, peace in hearts. Jesus said, "Blessed are the peacemakers..." Let peace begin with us, in our thoughts and words and even our small daily actions. Peace and love  -Jill

Candle of Peace © Jill Ja Photography 2014

An Ethical Lent

Well, as a rather new practitioner of Lent (started in 2009,  never really heard of it before then), I have had decent and so/so Lenten experiences thus far. All my life I was in churches that ignored Lent and all of the Holy Week practices except for Easter Sunday. When I decided to become a part time Episcopal in 2009, I discovered this really groovy mainline Protestant practice. I fell in love with the concept of it. Forty days of reflection and sacrifice, fasting, etc... who doesn't need that?! Now I found out quickly that some folks who grew up with Lent as a yearly tradition are rather blase about the whole thing, but in my first year I was very zealous and found it was a meaningful time. The following few years were not so hot, I was in grief and mourning a loss and struggling just to exist, Lent was taken very lightly if at all. Actually I don't even remember last year's Lent, only that I gave up after a few days of whatever I was going to do without and just wrote it off completely.

This year however, Lent has found me with my head (and heart) back in the game. As a tender hearted person towards animals since early childhood, eating beef and pork has always been an ethical issue that troubled me. I desire to be a vegetarian and I've had a few good go's at it, but didn't stick, I've quit fooling myself that I'll ever easily give up eating meat completely, but giving up eating cows and pigs has always been high on my agenda. The mistreatment of cows and pigs (and of course other factory farmed animals too) came to my attention sometime in my early thirties. I was disgusted and outraged, even sickened, but could not stop eating beef or pork even though it bothered me morally a lot of the time. Like Albert Einstein, "I have always eaten animal flesh with a somewhat guilty conscience."

Well, I decided to make giving up pork and beef a part of my Lent this year. Surprise, surprise, I've done it! Now don't shake your head and say, "So what, is that supposed to impress me?" Let me just clarify, I am a beef and pork eating machine, when I say I love the stuff, I mean I really love the stuff. Well, the good news is that it's been easy, real easy, like Divine intervention easy. I plan to keep going with it when Lent ends. I feel like a better person. I'll work on quitting other meats soon too perhaps, but I'm not quite ready just yet. One step at a time on this journey, this chicken will cross that road when she comes to it.

Holy Week Outside Of The Church

Holy Week Outside of The Church

Matthew 18:20 "For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.” -Jesus

I'm Jill and I'm a christian outside of the church. I left regular church-going a few years back. When I say church, I mean the church as an institution, all that brick and mortary stuff. My family packed it in after many years of being faithful churchgoers, giving up on finding a church in our community where we fit. I had most recently enjoyed Episcopal worship, they are typically progressive and I always felt at home there. Still, after a few 5 years of positive, but sporadic attendance with Episcopal brethren, I find myself, pretty much out of regular fellowship with traditional church.

Overall, Holy Week is a new tradition for me, I was greatly thrilled by it when I first started Episcopal services in 2009. The concept of Holy Week had been completely ignored by the churches I was brought up in and attended. It was all about Easter. No Lent, no Palm Sunday, no Good Friday or any of the other services. I was fascinated the first year by the observances and was greatly enriched by them. The last few years my enthusiasm for the church version of Holy Week (with all it's pageantry) has waned. In many ways the Episcopal church saved me from falling away from my faith, but now I don't feel as if I even need that safety net anymore.

I am currently a christian who is free-styling through life's journey, allowing myself to be of use where the Spirit leads me, learning to go with the flow. I have no walls to work within these days. Holy Week is observed now in my heart. I may get out and go to Easter this year, I might not. Either way, I'm good with whatever I decide. My faith and faith practices are always evolving, that is for certain and my needs change as the evolution continues day by day, year by year. One thing however remains consistent, and that is my connection to Christ, the abiding Divine Presence in my Spirit. In church or away from church,I'm never separated from that Love that dwells within.

This Holy Week and Easter, I will be reflecting on that Love whether in my computer chair or on a church pew.

Lord Christ, this Holy Week, let us reflect on your Divine Love, which abides with us all at all times and all places. Thank you for enlightening our hearts and minds that we may love as you loved us. So be it.

Holding it Together During Grief is Not a Christian Virtue

A lot of times in the Christian community, grief is minimized. There is one scripture that tells believers not to grieve as those who have no hope. Well, because of that one scripture, lots of folks push their grief aside and ignore it. This is very unhealthy. Grief is a natural process that needs to be addressed by everyone who suffers the loss of someone they love. If you are grieving and you are a believer, don't be afraid to let the tears flow, they are healing. Even if you believe your loved one is enjoying the awesomeness of heaven, you still need to cry, to articulate your grief and express it to heal emotionally and even spiritually. Please allow yourself this. Blessed are they that mourn..for they shall be comforted.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness... Martin Luther King Jr

Normal day, let me be aware of the treasure you are..

Am I the only one who has a hard time appreciating normal days?

An Adorable Dog

Just a picture of my pooch, Niki. 

Facebook Ex Bashing Seriously Just Needs To Stop

Among many of the annoying things that go on in Facebook-land, the "bashing of the ex" in my opinion, is the very worst. It's a horrible social media trend that seems to happen fairly regularly. In my tiny little friends list, there is typically a handful of people who bash their exes openly on FB. Even worse is that often their kids are on their friend's lists. Now even if what they are saying is true, little kids, pre-teens and teens don't need to hear it, in person or publicly on Facebook! Life is hard enough without all your friends and social contacts seeing your family drama play out on the page of one of your scorned or hurt parents. 

Even if kids are not involved, say you're single and childless and you feel the need to air your dirty laundry on your ex, that just makes you look like a shallow-minded, immature jerk. Save it for your shrink..or better yet, tell it to Jesus. I love this commentary below, shared with me by my friend Brenda today. It's for divorcing parents, but applies to everyone, married or not who are acting the fool in front of their kids during a breakup. 

It is in the Darkness..

The only service a friend can really render..

The Serenity Prayer