Advent 4 Items from BlogRoll plus Los Peces En El Río - Angela Aguilar Ft. Pepe Aguilar - Nueva Tradicion

No RantWoman is NOT going to provide a translation of this very rocked up villancico, at least not until RantWoman does a smidgeon of research about why the fish in the river are drinking in wonder at the sight  of God.




Digressions of rage and grief available about the current administrations barbaric immigration policies.


Digression also available about why in Spanish when a lot of the migrants are native speakers of various indigenous languages and barely speak Spanish.


But really RantWoman suggests, just shut up and listen to the music.

Los peces en el rio on Angela Aguilar's youtube page


updated 12/20/2021 to connect readers directly with Angela Aguilar's youtube channel and other social media











RantWoman is however happy to include two items from blog roll which also speak to her condition

And if RantWoman has not pulled nuggets out of the blog roll sufficiently to make clear her condition, oh well!




http://gatheringinlight.com/2018/12/14/on-learning-how-to-lose/


https://blog.canyoubelieve.me/2018/12/advent-shorts.html

Physical, excursion

RantWoman is this physical safety excursion to Planet RantWoman REALLY the best way you can find to observe the solstice? I mean we really have not asked you to elaborate on “If I tell you it is unsafe, you need to BELIEVE me”

 

Yep. RantWoman knows how to party. One is not required to like the invitation to party alongside…but if one pays attention to what works and what does not….

 

Wired

Great moments in matters of physical safety, the RantWoman edition with a nod to the friend who told RantWoman, thinking of memory only a a scale of months,  maybe it is not good to have such a long memory, well except for the part about what gets wired in and how or the part about what works and what does not.

 

Speaking of wired, RantWoman has to assume, based on lots of observation of the rant parents, that probably there are some physical reactions wired from events long ago, and not just from 2-year-old RantWoman fights with RantMom about taking glasses off at bedtime. Plus being grabbed is one of the most common blind person nightmares.

 

Crossing the Street

RantWoman to Friend A years ago, probably not exactly articulating the Grab the Blind Person and Bless them “it’s about crossing the street” point, “I am having trouble with (Conflict is a Gift of God Friend)”

 

Friend A “Why do you even hang out with…”

 

RantWoman to herself: gees. I was hoping for something like “say more” or “what would help?”

 

Any thoughts about what is or is not working in that conversation?

 

 

Friend A lately has been telling RantWoman she is learning all about ableism. Really? Have you considered inviting RantWoman into your discussions because guess what, it’s on the agenda…?

 

Any thoughts about what is or is not working in that conversation?

 

 

Friend B from “It’s about crossing the street” “RantWoman this email is just TOO LONG.”

 

Any thoughts about what is or is not working in that conversation, other than a hope that sometimes roles and titles come with expectations of more fortitude?

 

 

Life moved along. RantWoman stopped going walking with Conflict is a Gift of God Friend. RantWoman did not yet find the right words to talk regularly of Grab the Blind Person and Bless them except at blindness conventions where the line evoked gales of knowing laughter. . RantWoman learned that wheelchair users also have similar problems. Welcome to everyday ableism.

 

Toddlers

Life moved along. Some wonderful exuberant toddlers arrived. So did toddler browning motion, behavior which absolutely fries RantWoman’s nerves on safety grounds for herself and on behalf of tottery elders. At first, RantWoman’s Excessively Plain English to Quakerese filter repeatedly malfunctioned in the “nothing makes it out of RantWoman’s mouth direction.  Possibly just as well, especially since RantWoman keeps telling people, hard as it may be to believe, RantWoman sometimes gets so upset she cannot talk.

 

RantWoman accidentally found a conversation with someone else who handles the toddler Browning motion problem a different way. RantWoman wrote email which RantWoman recalls seeming to fall off the edge of the universe with no or inadequate response. HOWEVER, RantWoman observed toddlers growing with grandmother attention.

 

RantWoman also learned to come up with the right words for visitors with small ones who understand nothing about a white cane.

 

Ding. Ding. Ding. What WORKS here? Any elements that really do not work?

 

 

RantWoman spends LOTS of time and energy trying not to plow into people, trying to move among bobbing forms. Some of the forms are actual humans. Some of the forms are the various streams of fog, blur, multiple imagery, grow your own lava lamp floaters which arise when RantWoman’s eyes interact with bifocals and the environment. Trust RantWoman on this: mind-alterning substances are basically superfluous.

 

RantWoman spends still MORE time and energy trying not to plow into people, trying to move among bobbing forms. RantWoman has actually been doing this her whole life and, even after midlife eye calamities, can often recognize people by a combination of shape and rhythms of movement. NO ONE should take this for granted though.

 

Minders

Comes now RantWoman’s fraught moment in Business Meeting of utterly distressing concern for wheelchair accessibility for a tenant’s services. Afterward, besides preventing RantWoman from attending worship for a time one of the things tried was…drum roll please…Minders! Minders who, having never before sat next to RantWoman in worship suddenly felt entitled to try to sit next to RantWoman in worship, overpowering scents and all. RantWoman hopes this intrusion made SOMEONE feel better but RantWoman repeatedly moved away from these intrusions. RantWoman made such intrusion more difficult in other ways. RantWoman greatly appreciates others’ recognition that Minders Were Not Working!

 

Digression for the RantWoman in meetings experience. RantWoman specifically gave people permission to tap her on the arm if she was missing a visual cue. None of the people RantWoman gave this permission to remembered being given this permission. RantWoman also consulted with another blind friend about experience in meetings. That friend said just sit next to someone you feel safe sitting next to. RantWoman at one point analyzed a bunch of data and realized her sit next to strategy had a kink in it, a kink RantWoman does not feel like spelling out in blogdom.

 

RantWoman has also specifically sometimes asked someone to sit next to her in Business Meeting. But rantWoman has NEVER given anyone blanket permission to touch her without asking. It happened ONCE  RantWoman moved away quickly, which did not help because RantWoman moved in a direction she would have preferred not to move without seeing who was there. Touch Friend followed RantWoman but did IMMEDIATELY move away when RantWoman asked. And for RantWoman’s trouble, she got told, not asked by another Friend what a loving gesture the touch had seemed.  Did RantWoman need still MORE reasons for her head to explode? Does anyone besides RantWoman see the CONSENT issue here?

 

The Bus

The next part of today’s excursion to Planet RantWoman is about the bus. RantWoman rides the bus almost everywhere. RantWoman rides when the bus is nearly empty and RantWoman can easily find a seat facing forward near enough to the front still to hear the stop announcements. RantWoman also rides the bus when it is crammed full. If there are seats, RantWoman tucks as much of what she carries under her feet in order not to conk people on the head or trip other passengers.

 

RantWoman’s feet work better than her eyes, RantWoman sometimes stands and as a result sometimes winds up unintentionally conking other people with her baggage. Other passengers are not so courtesy-minded and a crowded bus also often means high risk of getting conked in the face by someone else’s baggage.

 

 

The day of the great Not Look very Far …an Idiot moment in Business Meeting, RantWoman realized she was surrounded, surrounded too close by people who never ride the bus and probably do not have their know when to move instincts as well wired as RantWoman does. RantWoman was not confident she could pick up her bag without conking anyone with it. At this point, RantWoman’s direct action “do what you can to stay calm and not move” reflexes also kicked in. But still more Planet RantWoman is on the itinerary.

 

 

RantWoman! You know that thought that muddled into your head about three men more concerned about a man’s feelings than a woman’s physical safety? You know articulating that will probably not be helpful? Nor will it be helpful to elaborate on how circumspect RantWoman was in an earlier very serious moment involving the word “insurance” in Business Meeting.

 

Yeah. God is going to have to help deal with that and if God can make sure the insurance exclamation makes it into the minutes…. It’s part of the many things matter very much and some things are way too fragile problem. Maybe the thought will just lurk amid RantWoman’s visual fog. Please hold all in the Light.

 

Sighted Guide

Please enjoy a special Blindness Tourism excursion about sighted guide techniques. Sighted Guide techniques are more or less standard practices for assisting blind people to get around. Sometimes a blind person will take a guide’s elbow. Sometimes a blind person will follow with a hand on the guide’s shoulder. Both of these can be awkward if the guide and the person being guided are substantially different in size. Ding! Ding!

 

(Sometimes blind people also line up with each person putting their hand on the shoulder of the person and front of them and relying on the front person’s cane skills.)

 

But the ONLY sighted guide technique RantWoman can deal with is following a guide by voice, admittedly difficult in noisy environments. Often at blindness conventions RantWoman spends the first day or so nearly jumping out of her skin around the “helpful” sighted volunteers. This year’s volunteers were more perceptive and less intrusive than average.

Most recently at this year’s convention, RantWoman was actually sighted guide, for a woman in a wheelchair; the wheelchair controls were even working decently, and follow was the order of the day but sense of space was critical.

 

But back to the Business Meeting excursion. RantWoman was surrounded, but not surrounded by people who to RantWoman’s knowledge have ever had any training about sighted guide issues. RantWoman was just clear it was safer for everyone for RantWoman not to move. As it was, RantWoman’s brain about melted reading one Friend’s earnest email. If RantWoman tells you it is unsafe, a member of a CARE and Accountability committee needs to believe her and maybe even try to help sort out the what works and what does not.

 

 

RantWoman WHY do you need to go on at such length? What is your intent?

 

Hold ALL in the Light.  Start there.

 

 

In faithfulness.

 

RantWoman

Blessed are those who mourn, and atom bombs

RantWoman, why do you keep mumbling “Jesus Christ on a Pizza Crust with kimchi and Goat Cheese”?

 

It’s the best seasonal exclamation RantWoman can muster right now.

 

Moments from Adult Religious Education, what does Christmas mean to you?

Oh Atom Bomb, composed by Madame Clerk and her brother, sung to Oh Tannenbaum and served with a mushroom cloud cake. 

O Atom Bomb, O Atom Bomb,

We trust in thy blast!

We know you'll blow the world to bits

To keep us safe from Communists!

O Atom Bomb, O Atom Bomb,

We trust in thy blast!

 

O Atom Bomb, O Atom Bomb,

We have no need to fear you!

All of your vengeance we can brave,

We'll just revert to life in caves!

O Atom Bomb, O Atom Bomb,

We have no need to fear you!

 

 

RantWoman was rolling on the floor with laughter, slightly dated lyrics or no.

 

RantWoman thanks Madam Clerk for retyping so RantWoman does not have to pull out her techno-contortions list to OCR the original image.

 

“Colonial Cooptation of pagan…. “ RantWoman is glad there was someone in the room to say this, but does not unite with the point of view.

 

SOMEONE (present in the room) one year took all the packages containing plastic models, opened them all and dumped the contents into one big pile. Guess how the children amused themselves.

 

In a big family, the anticipation game was trying to guess who was assigned to give presents to whom

 

More than one person spoke about a sense of being apart: because of growing up Quaker, because it’s a religious holiday dangit, not a commercial orgy, because pause and celebrate does not mean go to the mall.

 

Moments from Worship.

From Total Energy Vortex Friend, Friend, Friend who, how DOES she do it, ALWAYS manages to be about 12 times sunnier and more cheerful than RantWoman “Friends, I meant to tell you last week that I started chemo for multiple myeloma but…” Look, People, RantWoman is furious. Energy Vortex Friend is one of those behind the scenes total engines of the Meeting. RantWoman is mortified and RantWoman feels NO obligation to apologize on behalf of anyone else. If anything RantWoman feels a fit of further eldering coming on.

 

“RantWoman I am glad you are here today. I was not here last week but I am glad you are here today.”

 

“Blessed are those who mourn.” Okay good. RantWoman is sorry you are suffering. RantWoman does not even mind a sense of spiritual accompaniment about the evolution of the sufferings. Ya’ know, though,  after you spoke, RantWoman no longer needed to do something with meditations about always having communion on Christmas Eve at the Baptist Church. RantDad always found the practice morbid. RantWoman does not disagree, but part of the point of God in human form is all the crap that might befall this person after the birth in a stable thing wears off. Talk about magic challenged?

 

The other part of the “Blessed are those who mourn” message for RantWoman: RantWoman has been fretting about “ruining” others celebrations but RantWoman has decided the things making her head explode have some kind of holiday resonance in her Meeting and therefore RantWoman must continue to muddle forward.

 

By muddle forward, RantWoman this week needed a dose of all life a prayer and “whatever am I to wear?” RantWoman reported in worship: God told her to wear a T-shirt, covered with a jumper. The message on the T-shirt is exactly on point, but it is in language deliciously inappropriate for Meeting for Worship. Lord help us all.

 

If we are lucky, RantWoman will be able to corral her makes head explode twitches and muster words concisely as befits the tastes of people who persist in thinking either that people who have just been through traumatizing circumstances will automatically be able to write carefully sculpted and precisely edited emails or that emails should not arrive at all if one does not like the content.

 

RantWoman is both appreciating and mourning circumstances to do with RantBrother. Piquant details available upon request; RantWoman DOES mean to extract community meaning…

 

Postscript

Actual live in-person conversation with Not an Idiot Friend.

RantWoman APPLAUDS. Okay, after cancellation of a Saturday event RantWoman was aiming for a 20-minute phone call with maybe someone else on the line just to uphold the conversation. Not an Idiot Friend said he would try to set it up but that did not happen. Next Time RantWoman wants that, she will take responsibility for scheduling.

 

RantWoman to Not an Idiot friend, “Look, I did not intend to call you an idiot. I have been on both sides of the Idiot word or some equivalent in the workplace. Granted “idiot” in the workplace is not the best idea either, but really, is that the worst thing you have ever been called?

 

In return, Not an Idiot Friend asked RantWoman, that physical safety issue? Really?

Let’s see which pre-existing threads someone will have to hear AGAIN, on top of new stuff.

 

Questions Not Heard

RantWoman, what does your T-shirt say? The one God told you to wear, the one with a spot-on message in language completely inappropriate for Meeting for Worship.

 

RantWoman, would you care to say more about “Not Physically safe..” Either in this Instance or ups and downs over time?

Advent 3 with red cactus and connection

Forget all the psychic muddle and meandering coming this year with RantWoman's

Red Cactus of Connection

Christmas cactus cornucopia. This Christmas cactus is one of help coming from unusual directions. RantWoman's cactuses have been out on the Twitter for weeks and today this one came back. It blooms later than RantWoman's. The red is gorgeous.

The connection behind the Christmas cactus is one of those Twitter things, a journalist in Spokane with whom RantWoman disagrees passionately about many things—abortion, democrats…-- and from time to time finds some wonderful point of agreement such as “the next episode of Trump TV” or let’s try to take care of the kids who already are alive.” RantWoman appreciated a recent thread from when the Pennsylvania Attorney General issued its report about sexual misconduct among Catholic priests: the women talking about it thought the first thing they should do is fast and pray!

RantWoman has been having meandering dialogue about among other things ”Younger people.” One of RantWoman’s current “younger people” stories is a young Friend from eastern WA who worshipped among us from time to time while getting an MPA and who RantWoman now sees in the rest of her life because he has a job related to digital inclusion in Tacoma. Last time he worshipped among us, the journalist from Spokane came up along with the question “How do you know her?” The connection made both sides of the conversation smile.

Abundance--of something?

Dear Readers

First you must choose your meme for today’s excursion to Planet RantWoman. Options include:

Random update for no reason software enhancement

Tinker Vs Des Moines First Amendment Supreme Court case upholding students right to wear black armbands to school during the Christmas season to protest the Vietnam war. This meme is here because RantWoman’s eighth grade history teacher cited as one of the most important Supreme Court cases ever, right behind Brown vs Board of education.

Blurred vision, double vision, and euphoria, the side effects of a long ago RantBrother pharmacological regimen. RantWoman does fine about blurred vision and double vision without any pharmaceutical help, but where the heck is the euphoria?

Biblical readings from Psalm 121, RSV, grade 2 NON-UEB braille or a Christmas passage from Isaiah 41 read with female pronouns for the divine, just to add another badass element.

Should we go with the Middle East themed bomb threats or can we work on the spending an hour and a half figuring out how to pray together angle?

Holiday manger scene with all the different symbolic creatures and personages, perhaps for Planet RantWoman as embodied in paper pasted to plywood with reinforced framing and sand bags and bales of hay to keep everything from blowing over in the howling Colorado winds of RantWoman’s childhood.

Some sort of ungainly holiday pageant, perhaps under coordinated second graders whose costumes are always askew or perhaps the sort of high schoolers RantWoman met on the bus the other day: RantWoman listened to enough of their conversation ALMOST to go all motherly on then and suggest they take care of their brain cells and get help about their substance abuse issues. Then the bus arrived at the stop for their school.

A scary, scary demon with horns and a giant cape…

　

RantWoman, we don’t CARE about a meme. Get to the Point.

Oh, but you must have a meme and you must also say Thank you, because that is the rule on Planet RantWoman even about "help" that is not helpful.

　

Are we ready? Get comfortable because this may take awhile AND wind around a bit. May the Lord Bless and Keep you and make his face to shine upon you and give you peace…

　

Welcome to Great Moments in Business Meeting, Accessibility Edition, Round 2 of the past year or so. Round 1 some readers may remember involved RantWoman daring to speak of wheelchair accessibility for services provided by one tenant. RantWoman is humble about whatever all added up to Madame Clerk needing to stalk out of the room. Tonight RantWoman will spare readers a Dial A Tirade sidebar about events after that business meeting. RantWoman greatly esteems the current clerk if only for pluck and fortitude. RantWoman also would not mind having different gifts herself and perhaps a meme other than the scary demon with big nasty horns that seems to appear to others whenever RantWoman tries to speak even very carefully of accessibility. Somehow the scary demon goes away when other people speak on RantWoman’s behalf, but that is pretty average #disabilityinchurch ableism and who the heck wants to be average?

Tonight we bring you Great Moments in Business Meeting, Accessibility Edition Round 2 starring Madame Clerk, Not an Idiot Friend, Self-Righteous Twenty-Something Friend, Friend who thinks growling at RantWoman will help, RantWoman, I’m not interested in your thought processes Friend, and a further cast of thousands. RantWoman invokes rather frank Noms de Blog with great caring, deep affection, and respect or at least as much of those as the love and care mentioned in the Still Didn’t get the Memo Committee on Email Immoderation announcement in the Bulletin. RantWoman also sincerely thanks Not an Idiot Friend and I am Not Interested in Your Thought Processes Friend for honest expressions of emotion, truly! Please understand RantWoman’s memory is imperfect, but this is how this month’s proceedings looked through RantWoman’s womky eyeballs.

　

The preparation: RantWoman has been seasoning a leading to work on disability issues for awhile. RantWoman has assembled an able adhoc committee though RantWoman selfishly would like to beg the time of a couple more Friends. RantWoman has drafted an outline of some topics, ideas, approaches and also wanted to offer Meeting for Business space to help shape the work. RantWoman has decreed that the committee will work some of the time by conference call and / or email. RantWoman has already had push-back from one committee volunteer about email, but email is an important part of RantWoman’s accessible work process protocol and RantWoman trusts that PushBack Friend will be able to cope. RantWoman has seasoned one idea enough to be ready to schedule a conference call.

RantWoman wrote up a sloppy draft of her ideas and hoped to work on them with the Care and Accountability Committee named in her direction but other members of said committee pushed in other directions. In other words, the Care and Accountability Committee is part of the impetus for focused work.

RantWoman also would have taken her draft ideas to the pre-business meeting planning meeting called Coordinating Committee, but RantWoman and Madame Clerk agreed that conversation about business meeting could happen later in the week. At that point Madame Clerk demurred: she did not want to bring anything to business meeting that had not gone to Coordinating committee, BUT RantWoman would be allowed to make an announcement and have a table at lunch afterward. This option is NOT preferable on Planet RantWoman because RantWoman finds noisy environments hard to deal with; also RantWoman was due at Irrepressible Nephew’s birthday.

Apparently God had other ideas anyway, other ideas in the form of hours and hours (well not really but close) fussing about minutes and other moments as below.

Meeting for Worship with attention to business opened as usual: welcome, reading, introduction of people visiting or attending Meeting for Business for the first time. God and those in attendance made it through announcements and the first two items with little fanfare. Then it was time for minutes. RantWoman appreciates Madame Clerk allowing her to ask how many others besides RantWoman read the draft minutes when they come out by email on Friday. RantWoman was pleased to have a sense that several Friends do, but RantWoman could not see and did not ask for a precise count. RantWoman also pblutly spoke of need to be honest about what works and what does not work. Hence some detail here. RantWoman is VERY grateful for many things that make a great deal of difference. RantWoman wants Friends to understand what matters, and RantWoman is ruthless about freeing everyone of things that do not work.

　

RantWoman was called to offer two corrections to a previous month’s report about the Care and Accountability Committee. RantWoman will spare readers all the details of the discussion. Are RantWoman’s corrections factual? RantWoman spoke only to things she specifically remembers saying. The Recording clerk had already discarded her notes. She also acknowledged considering what to record of RantWoman’s previous month comments with others, though when RantWoman emailed after reading the minutes on Friday, Friend Recording Clerk said she would only corrections in the "worshipful" space of Meeting for Business. Sigh. RantWoman is an all life is a prayer Quaker and figured Light might show up many ways.

One of RantWoman’s corrections is somewhat redundant to something already in the draft minutes but RantWoman specifically remembered speaking to it and wanted it in the minutes. Another referred to a long ago nominating committee conversation, a conversation from before the era of the person who then spoke. Would the points of concern to RantWoman even be in the old committee minutes? Should corrections appear at all? Should they appear in the current month’s minutes or with the previous month’s minutes? RantWoman deeply blesses the Friend who underscored RantWoman’s points but more Friends kept wanting to weigh in about this month or last month and the clerk keep asking the room whether there was unity about what to include. No. More discussion. Round and round.

Somewhere in the round and round NOT an idiot Friend spoke of feeling deeply hurt by the juxtaposition of his name and the word Idiot. RantWoman tried to respond to the pain and apologize. RantWoman wonders after the fact whether she should also apologize for failing to speak up for a long long time about utter exasperation with Not and Idiot Friends communications practices. In any case, RantWoman was speaking her truth as comfortingly as she could manage and this was not enough for Self Righteous Twenty Something Friend. Self Righteous Friend was so offended he thought RantWoman should leave or, others insist, leave for the day and so apparently did the rest of the room.

RantWoman had already spoken of moments in Quaker history when a Friend is called to stand or in this case sit alone. RantWoman was very clear she was not going anywhere and not just because of being ferociously not in unity to leave from the very discussion she is led to have. RantWoman was not going anywhere on grounds of safety for everyone. RantWoman is large, legally blind, and not well-coordinate when she is upset or angry, By that time Friends had tried to surround RantWoman and RantWoman was clear to sit.

One Friend voiced outrage and stomped out. RantWoman was told others apparently also stomped out.

So the rest of the room decided to sing and then leave.

Jesus Christ on a pizza crust with Kimchi and Goad Cheese!

PLEASE hold us all in the Light.

Sincerely

RantWoman.

Hanukkah 8 Six13 - Bohemian Chanukah (a Queen adaptation)

Cornucopia with Email Immoderation

An announcement in the weekly bulletin at RantWoman’s meeting. Nominating Committee has trouble filling many roles but the Still Didn’t Get the Memo Committee on Email Immoderation appears to be doing just fine. Imagine if Nominating Committee were able to use the energy flowing among the "harsh" and "rambling" words. 

 

• Our Meeting includes individuals whose comments, ministry and/or emails may be aggressive,

harsh, or rambling, and who misuse Quaker process. We are working on bringing our

community together to hold these Friends both in the Light and accountable for their words

and actions. If you have questions or concerns, speak with the individual closing meeting for

worship. If you experience or witness harassment, either in person or online please notify

Care and Counsel Committee. The co-clerks are Friend A (who has various Noms de Blog) and Friend B (known in RantWoman’s experience for NOT interacting with his email AT ALL)

 

Draft minutes SHOULD say something like

“The announcement in the bulletin…refers to more than one person.”

 

RantWoman will be offering a correction.