On Edge

I continue in this very, very bad mood – belligerent, aggrieved, and coiled to strike. It’s a real struggle to keep it sub rosa.

I can’t tell whether it’s a manifestation of my Seasonal Affective Disorder or a response to the world around me. But the disembodied spirit of my mother in all its borderline personality dysfunction is desperately trying to lock in a channel.

It’s really irritating me that the response of most of the people with whose political stances I roughly align to the Inland Center Massacre is a call for better gun control.

I’ve never shot a gun in my life and probably never will, though I’ve always thought that shooting targets at a range sounded like great fun.

Nonetheless, I’ve always been a fan of the Second Amendment.

It has nothing to do with logic. It has to do with those strange post-apocalyptic dreams I’ve been having all my life; and that trip to Sarajevo I took in the early 1970s; and my sense that people who think, It can’t happen here, are clueless.

Sure. No private citizen should own an assault weapon (though it’s easy enough, I suppose, to turn rifles into assault weapons) and yes, they need to do background checks at gun shows.

Still…

I’m thinking the Inland Center Massacre is substantiatively different from other mass shooting incidents.

I don’t believe for one minute that the couple involved in the Inland Center Massacre were “self-radicalized.”

I’m thinking the woman was radicalized when she went to college in Pakistan, and that she was instructed to marry an American.

I’m thinking she wasn’t the only one.

I’m thinking that the bureaucrats who were supposed to investigate that fiancée visa did a shitty job and are now engaged in a massive CYA dance that will probably result in the suppression of evidence.

I’m thinking I loathe Salafist Islam, and I have no interest whatsoever in being tolerant toward it.

I’m thinking that I don’t care if that landlord violated the dead killers’ civil rights by allowing tabloid media types to photograph their apartment.

(This last one was a source of huge indignation and outcry on the part of most of the people with whose political stances I roughly align.)

I’m thinking that calling for tighter gun control if ISIS is actually in this country is akin to telling sheep to put out the welcome mat for wolves. I mean, after all wolves have fur, too! It’s different from the fleece we have. But it’s body hair coverage, right?

Uh huh.

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What I can’t tell is whether my thoughts are at all legitimate, since as I say, I’m feeling psychically unbalanced.

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In other news, the fabulously named Lois Lane has offered me my choice of two (count ‘em) ESL students – both female, one from Pakistan (wears hajib), one from Egypt (studied psychology; in the U.S. as a political refugee.) I’m inclined to go Egyptian just because I’ve spent so much time in Egypt.

I’m currently writing a travel guide for Poland. Big bucks! Though I don’t think the payoff will come before the holiday.

I bought matching red holiday pajamas for Liza and Noodle.

I’ve been sick. Really weird intestinal thing. I’ve been ignoring it ‘cause that’s basically what I do, but yesterday, while I was running, I felt… weak. Had to stop. Entertained vivid fantasy of Stage 4 Cancer diagnosis. Do I want chemo and radiation, or do I want a 6-month supply of opiates and death? Ch-ch-ch-choices!

Feel as though all this psychic weirdness would go away if I could just do a four-hour talk marathon with someone who Speaks the Language.

The weekend will be a blur of children’s basketball games, Christmas craft shows, and barbecue.