173 Beats A Minute: On One Surprising Little Baby And The Possibility Of Tiny Miracles | Sarah Bessey
On the morning of the final ultrasound check, I went to the coffee shop and I wrote an entire blog post telling the world about how we had lost another baby and how the sorrow was swallowing me whole this time. I scheduled it to post the next morning. Then I drove to the doctor’s office to meet my husband.
And if this were what “white privilege” meant—which it is not—defensiveness and frustration would be the appropriate response. But privilege talk is not intended to make a moral assessment or a moral claim about the privileged at all. It is about systemic imbalance. It is about injustices that have arisen because of the history of racism that birthed the way things are now. It’s not saying, “You’re a bad person because you’re white.” It’s saying, “The system is skewed in ways that you maybe haven’t realized or had to think about precisely because it’s skewed in YOUR favor.”
What would I say to my own daughters, if they were teenagers right now, with all of this info in their Twitter feeds? Girls, sit by me, let me tell you a story, and let’s hope it has a happy ending. Society sends confusing messages: women are supposed to be hot, but also puritanical. Be sexy, but in an unassuming way! Be sexy, but without knowing that you’re being sexy! Be sexy, but not too sexy. You’re expected to wear a t-shirt to cover your swimsuit clad body at church youth group pool outings, but let’s talk about how safe and streamlined it is to be in the deep end with yards of heavy cotton fabric floating around your collarbone. Women are supposed to be sexy; women are supposed to age flawlessly; women can’t gain too much weight nor lose too much, either. In religious circles, it may get even more complicated. Women are supposed to be attractive, but not too attractive, but definitely not frumpy. Good luck finding a balance where you’re neither chastised or pitied.
My Father’s Search For The Fisher King | How To Be a Dad
Both men, Robin and my father Stephen, had their ashes spread over an ocean, each on an opposite side of the country. Both fought demons most of their natural existence. And both killed themselves. One used a belt. The other did it slowly over a lifetime of poor choices. I’m frustrated with them both, even now. Unreasonably so. It’s very selfish, I know. I keep expecting some new joy they could bring me, and all I have is this celluloid version of them.
New Study Finds Link Between Breastfeeding, Always Knowing What’s Right For Everyone | The Onion
A study published Tuesday by researchers at Johns Hopkins University has discovered a correlation between breastfeeding and unequivocally knowing what’s best for other people at all times. “The data suggests that the simple behavior of breastfeeding one’s infant dramatically improves a woman’s ability to identify with perfect precision what’s wrong with everyone else in every situation,” reads the study, which observed thousands of nursing mothers nationwide and documented their heightened wisdom of postnatal care, publicly acceptable behavior, proper food choices, pediatric development, and countless other issues.
