Death and Queen of Wands
Today you were going to be so organized and get so much done! Sorry about that.

oozey mess
Claire Keane
macklin celebrini has autism
YOU ARE THE REASON
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Janaina Medeiros
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â

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@survivormom316
Death and Queen of Wands
Today you were going to be so organized and get so much done! Sorry about that.
đŸ đđđ
Warning: big, ugly feelings ahead. TW for...I don't know, parental abuse by their disabled adult child?
I've never seen a support group for that anywhere outside of the relative anonymity of the internet. It feels shameful, even though it's not our fault. And I have a feeling there are more of us out there than most people know.
I don't want him incarcerated, restrained, scared or hurt. It won't help. That kind of trauma would terrify him and make him worse. It doesn't fix anything.
And my sweet baby boy is still in there somewhere. Sometimes he peeps out at us. He sang the Happy Birthday song from Blue's Clues to his grandma last week.
I don't know how to process being hurt by someone I would literally die to protect. I love him. I hate... not him but what he does and how he behaves.
I fear him.
And I'm so fucking tired.
Just slaps on my shoulder and arm this time. No grievous physical injury. No broken glasses this time. I threw the water in the cup I was holding in my hand at him to get him away from me. And I'm glad he took his medication before the bomb went off.
All because I told him his riding lesson was canceled. Because his behavior was unsafe and I couldn't risk taking him. I didn't say that second part because I was trying to avoid the explosion.
It came anyway. It usually does when he doesn't get his way or we tell him "no."
But it's not his fault.
He's a bully.
He's my baby boy.
He abuses the people who love him the most.
Social services are reactive and inadequate. We've called for help. By the time they arrive the storm is over. They take a report, talk to him, tell him to stop hurting mom, and they leave. Same at the emergency room. I would not let them admit him to the adult inpatient psych unit anyway. It would traumatize him.
He's 5'10", around 240lb. Strong.
And mentally and emotionally he's a child, with a child's ability/inability to reason.
I'm his guardian. I'm his voice. I'm his advocate. And I love him fiercely.
He's my son.
He's my jailer.
He's my abuser.
He's crying again. "I'm so sorry, mommy. Please forgive me."
"I love you, mommy."
I love you too, baby. I'll always love you.
Of course I forgive you.
(I'm afraid of you. And I know we'll do this same dance again tomorrow. Or the next day.)
I'll cry. I'll sleep (or try to sleep). And I'll start over again tomorrow. Not because I'm some kind of saint, but because I have no choice.
I'm not looking for pity, or sympathy. I'm just word dumping all over the page because this confused mess of big conflicting feelings has to go somewhere. If you read it, please be kind.
That's enough.
đâš A Benediction for the River Towns
May the Creator â no matter their name,
no matter the language you speak to them in,
no matter the shape they take in your heart â
meet you where you are
and walk with you where youâre going.
May the teachings you learned in childhood
and the wisdom you gathered in the wild
find each other like old friends
and sit together at your table.
May âharm noneâ
and âdo unto othersâ
rise in your spirit as the same ancient truth â
spoken in different tongues,
carried by different people,
but pointing toward the same light.
May the red letters guide your compassion,
and the sevenâfold law guide your conscience.
May the river remind you that everything flows,
and nothing meant for you will ever drift away.
May your prayers be heard,
whether whispered to the sky,
murmured to the trees, spoken at the altar,
or held silently in your chest.
May your faith be wide enough
to hold mystery,
and your spirit strong enough
to hold peace.
May you see the divine in every face â
the familiar, the strange,
the ones you love,
and the ones you donât understand yet.
And may the good you send into the world
return to you sevenâfold,
like a blessing carried by the river,
soft as a hymn,
steady as moonlight,
true as love.
Go gently.
Go boldly.
Go in peace.
đđ„ AN HONEST OPEN LETTER TO THE AREA I CAME HOME TO
riverâborn âą witchâtouched âą Christianâmystic âą blackâsheep truth
To the people of Quincy, Hannibal, and every little river town stitched around and between them:
Mist folks around here only know me as âLayneâs niece,â or âMikeâs daughter from his first marriage,â or âDwayneâs wife.â
And thatâs alright. We left in the late 90's and didnât come back until the river called us home again.
The area stayed the same.
I didnât.
And yes, Iâm still the girl who grew up in that small river town that thinks itâs the big city because we have a Target and a Walmart.
But Iâve walked a few more roads since then â some paved, some dirt, some spiritual, some political, some that wound through forests where the air felt older than scripture.
And yes, I keep crystals in my pocket now.
Not because theyâre magic wands â but because they remind me to stay grounded, stay kind, and stay awake.
Hereâs something folks donât always know about me:
I wasnât raised in church culture â just adjacent to it.
I went to VBS a few times.
I visited churches with friends.
I got handed Bibles by grandparents who loved us fiercely and feared for our souls just as fiercely.
I learned âJesus loves meâ on the playground, not in a pew.
So naturally, I grew up and became a Christian as an adult.
Because thatâs how my life works.
And hereâs the part Iâll never forget:
When my young family walked into that big Foursquare church in Oregon â a church born on the West Coast, shaped by revival energy and a kind of spiritual openness you donât always find elsewhere â we found a community we didnât even know we needed.
They were warm.
They were alive.
They were accepting â at least on the surface, and often in truth.
And when life cracked open beneath our feet, they showed up.
They held us through some of the hardest seasons we ever faced.
For that, I will forever be grateful.
That love was real.
That support mattered.
And nothing that came after erases the good they did.
But even in that place, I started noticing something that didnât sit right.
The red letters â the teachings I fell in love with â said things like:
âą love your neighbor
âą care for the vulnerable
âą donât judge
âą donât use faith as a weapon
âą humility matters
âą compassion matters
But some of the loudest voices â both in church (not so much from the pulpit, but from the voices in the seats around us) and back home â were saying something very different.
And the dissonance between the two was loud enough to shake the walls of our very modern, very unstainedâglass sanctuary.
And then â years later â I learned what my daughter had been taught in those same halls.
The purity culture.
The shame.
The whispered rules about her body, her worth, her voice.
The things she didnât feel safe telling me because she thought she was the problem.
That discovery cracked something open in me.
It made the questions louder.
Sharper.
More urgent.
Because faith should never make a child feel unworthy of love or conversation.
So I stepped back.
I asked questions.
I learned where the Bible actually came from â the councils, the translations, the politics, the choices about what stayed in and what didnât.
That didnât make the teachings meaningless.
It just made them human.
I didnât lose my faith.
I outgrew the box it came in.
And let me be clear: I still have faith.
The Creator of the Universe and I are on good terms.
We talk.
We understand each other.
I just donât picture them as the white, male, sternâfaced authority figure who looks like heâd scold you for running in the fellowship hall and then tell you exactly how to vote.
My Creator is bigger than that.
Older than that.
Kinder than that.
And not limited to one cultureâs imagination.
These days, my spirituality looks a little witchy â the Southern Gothic kind, where the river hums old truths and the wind carries wisdom if youâre quiet enough to hear it.
I believe in âharm none,â which is just another way of saying âdo unto others.â
I believe what you send out comes back to you sevenâfold â which is just a poetic way of saying consequences matter.
And I believe most of us have far more in common than the loudest voices want us to remember.
I choose love.
I choose light.
I choose peace.
I choose to stand with people whoâve been pushed aside.
I choose to care about the earth we live on.
I choose to believe that diversity is a strength, not a threat.
I choose to believe that compassion matters more than conformity.
I love my family.
I love where I come from.
But I wonât be made to feel ashamed because my worldview doesnât match the one most common around here.
Iâm still Heather.
Still family.
Still the girl who grew up in the river town with the big city swagger.
Just with a little more magic in my pockets â literal crystals and metaphorical courage â and a wider view of the world.
If that makes me the black sheep, then so be it.
Every flock needs one â otherwise how would yâall know when youâre drifting off the path?
With love â and a whole lot of peace,
Heather
Iâm trying to process everything swirling around Charlie Kirkâs death, and the national response that followed. I didnât know him personally. I donât hate him. I donât hate anyone. But I do believe he was dangerously wrong on some deeply important issues. He had a gift for persuasion, especially among those without access to broader perspectivesâand that influence came with real consequences.
Still, I donât condone murder. What happened to him was evil. His family deserves justice, and I hope they find peace. The shooter should be held accountable, regardless of motive. Violence is never the answer.
Whatâs harder to process is the way our country responded. Air Force Two. Flags at half-staff. The Presidential Medal of Freedom. These are honors reserved for public servants and national heroes. Charlie Kirk was a public figure, yesâbut he was not a hero. He didnât hold office. He wasnât elected. He wasnât accountable to the people. And yet he was elevated in death in a way that felt deeply political and deeply unsettling.
I canât stop thinking about Melissa Hortman, her husband Mark, and their dog Gilbertâmurdered in their own home earlier this year in a politically motivated attack. Melissa was a public servant. She gave her life to this country. And yet there was no national mourning. No lowered flags. No presidential tribute. Just silence.
I keep wondering how different things would feel right now if Kamala Harris had won. Maybe weâd still be dividedâbut I doubt weâd be this performative. No tariffs. No big ugly bill. No Elon and Doge circus. No ICE escalation. And maybeâjust maybeâweâd still have some international respect. I donât think she would have insulted our closest neighbors the way Trump has.
Iâm not trying to rewrite history. Iâm just trying to make sense of the present. We can mourn a death without rewriting a life. We can reject violence without glorifying harmful influence. And we can hold our leaders accountable for who they choose to honorâand who they choose to ignore.
Election myths are louder than ever. Letâs cut through the noise.
Former President Trump has called for banning mail-in ballots and voting machines, claiming theyâre inaccurate, expensive, and fraudulent. Heâs even suggested states must follow federal orders on how to run elections. Thatâs not just wrongâitâs unconstitutional.
And hereâs another myth heâs pushing:
đłïž That the United States is the only country that uses mail-in ballots.
Thatâs simply false.
đ Countries like Canada, Germany, Australia, Switzerland, and the UK all use mail-in voting in some form. In fact, many democracies offer absentee voting for citizens abroad, the elderly, or those with disabilities. Itâs not a fringe ideaâitâs a global norm.
So why push this narrative? Because if you convince people that voting by mail is suspicious, you can cast doubt on any election result you donât like.
Hereâs whatâs real:
âą đŹ Mail-in ballots are secure, trackable, and essential for millions of voters.
âą đ„ïž Voting machines are tested, certified, and auditedâoften more reliable than hand counts.
âą đ Statesânot the presidentâcontrol elections. Thatâs how federalism works.
The idea that Democrats are âunelectableâ without mail-in ballots isnât just falseâitâs a dangerous lie that undermines democracy itself. Voters from both parties use mail-in voting. Losing an election doesnât mean the system is broken. It means the people spoke.
We deserve leaders who respect the rule of law.
We deserve elections built on facts, not fear.
We deserve a democracy that honors every voteâwhether cast in person, by mail, or through a machine.
If we let misinformation win, we lose more than an election.
We lose the foundation of our country.
#ElectionIntegrity #DemocracyDefense #MailInVoting #TumblrPolitics #ProtectTheVote
Black-and-yellow Broadbill (Eurylaimus ochromalus), family Eurylaimidae, order Passeriformes, Malaysia
Photograph by Kin L. Fong
This bird is judging you.
Miraculous!!!
The face-eating panther feast continues.
But seriously, if somebody says this in front of you? Don't point and laugh. Don't say "PATHERS ATE YOUR FACE" or "SERVES YA RIGHT YOU MAGA PIECE OF SHIT" or "BOO FUCKING HOO"
Instead, express sympathy.
Agree with them that yeah, what happened absolutely sucks. And yeah, it appears he maybe lied to get your vote? Politicians lie all the time, and it's a shame he took advantage of you this time.
Remember: deradicalized, ex-cult members are some of the angriest people on earth, and we need that anger. Because we need everybody we can get if we're gonna beat these fascist assholes.
exactly. these people were consistently duped and the moment they stop denying that to themselves, they will want to fight back. not all of these maga weirdos are nazis or white supremacists or culty evangelists. many of them are just low information voters who got tricked by expensive rhetoric that was specifically designed to trick them.
Whatâs going to need to be done to improve this situation is deeply annoying to me (because I have to admit that I often sneakily enjoy watching the faces of the cruel and uncaring get eaten). And Iâm sure others will share my annoyance. But when these people fall, and realize theyâve fallen⊠if the rest of us ever want such folksâ original behavior to changeâto have a chance to shift toward something less toxicâsomebody has to be there to catch them.
This approach has at least a chance of making meaningful change. And some people on the Other Side know this, and hate it⊠seeing it as a way theyâll lose power. They betray their true motivations by trying to discredit empathy and compassionâby characterizing them as weakness. And the language they use, trying to be clever, csn accidentally be most revealing.
âThe âempathy exploit,ââ Musk called it the other day. As if the manifestation of understanding someone elseâs trouble, and feeling/expressing compassion for it, was somehow unfair, like using a cheat code in a game to get an unearned advantage. Thatâs the level such people are operating on: that the only thing that matters is winning the gameâwhatever theyâve decided the current game isâand (from their POV) fuck whatever human sufferingâs being experienced on the other side. If those people werenât weak, and losers, they wouldnât be suffering, right?
(exasperated sigh) I know which side of this argument I prefer to come down on, even though itâs gonna really annoy me, sometimes, for years to come. Somebody in the room has to swallow her grim amusement and, when confronted by one of these people, move through into a mode that has a chance to make someoneâs life less painful.
(shrug) Canât be helped. Might as well get on with it, day by day: decreasing local entropy by incrementsâŠ
Sometimes itâs all one can do. But it makes a difference.
Theyâre finding out. We need to be there to catch them for two reasons:
1. Weâre good, compassionate humans who care about people. Even the ones who make stupid decisions. And the other side sure as hell wonât help them.
2. We NEED their anger and frustration to fuel our fight.
Kagu, a bird on the brink of extinction meets one of its own kind
Me, when I meet someone who is just as weird as I am!
Sir Terry Pratchett was not remotely in the vicinity of Fucking-Around, and had never even heard of that ridiculous thing some of his esteemed colleagues referred to as âChill.â (1)
(1) In point of fact, he had heard of it, on numerous occasions, most often when a friend or well-meaning-but-politely-horrified acquaintance advised him to locate some, but he always studiously ignored this in favor of a much more productive righteous fury, which he kept hot enough to boil the kettle for his afternoon tea. If the world was not going to work as it should, then damn it all, he would create one in which people had some blasted sense for a change. And he did. Spite, as it turns out, makes for an excellent motivator.
Mona Lisa cat nest đ
That's all kinds of clever
ACTIVATING DEATH RAY
Your death will be quick and pineless
My life is now better with this pun in it.
Absurd Item: Pinecone Death Ray, which inflicts a pineless death.