A thread on Facebook caught my attention last week. It was on a neighborhood page, where the Discourse is usually confined to incensed complaints about the homeless and reports of lost cats. This one was posted by an administrator and titled “Ask an atheist.” It was an invitation for questions, and the thread was, miraculously for fb, respectful.

One guy posited that atheism was itself a form of religion. This was so silly that I jumped in to ask how an absence of belief could be deemed a form of belief.

I learned that there is “hard” atheism and “soft” atheism, and I learned a fun new word: Ignosticism. This is the idea that the question of the existence of God is meaningless because the word “God” has no coherent and unambiguous definition. That sounds kind of petulant and argumentative, doesn’t it?

I’ve always considered myself an atheist but now I realize that I’m more of an apatheist.

Apatheism considers the question of the existence or nonexistence of deities to be fundamentally irrelevant in every way that matters.

I know that “god” doesn’t exist but I don’t care either way. Let god believe in me, if he/she wants. The whole idea is stupid but others are welcome to it as long as they don’t tell me to have a blessed day. I must say that the stupidest form of religion is the one whose adherents say, following a terrible personal tragedy, that their faith in god helped them through it. The fact that god didn’t prevent the tragedy in the first place doesn’t seem to bother them.

You probably know that in most societies, women are more religious than men, but have you wondered why? There is no scholarly consensus on this. There is the theory that this gender gap in religiosity is caused by differences in risk preference between men and women. Risk preference theory argues that irreligiousness is a form of risk taking because irreligiousness risks eternal punishment such as going to hell. Because women tend to be more risk averse than men, they are more religious.

Another argument is that women are more likely to be sanctioned for nonconforming behaviors than men; thus, choosing to be nonreligious is more socially risky for women. To avoid stigma or social sanctioning, women tend to choose to be religious. I like this one. It blames the patriarchy, and why not?

But wait! Among Jews and Muslims, men are more religious than women. In these religions, men are required to attend public religious services while women are not. So again, blame the patriarchy (or maybe thank the patriarchy.)

As an apatheistic Jew, I admit that Christians who are super vocal about their religion tend to either annoy me or perversely amuse me. I have kind of an alter ego who I call the Hissing S lady, who is very Southern and very Christian. When I do this character, it’s hard for me to stop. Luckily, my husband doesn’t mind her. You can enjoy her here.

*For extra credit, go see a category of Renaissance art that depicts Jesus with an erection.

News of the crazy new restrictions to abortion rights in Texas has triggered memories of the abortion I had at seventeen. I’d been living in London for a little over a year and I was deep into a relationship with a 21 year old student. I don’t remember what I was doing for birth control, but it obviously didn’t work.

I remember bring surprised, but pleased. I think I thought it was romantic to be a teenage mother, and it awakened my urge to nurture. As an unloved kid, I harbored the fantasy of a loving mother-child bond. At first the boyfriend adjusted to the idea of fatherhood and said he was up for it. But then he changed his mind. I had to have an abortion, or we were through.

I called my mom in California, and asked her if I could move back in with her and have the baby. She whined, “Can’t you get him to marry you?” She wasn’t up for it either. So the boyfriend  arranged an abortion with his family doctor, and I went to have the procedure in a daze, courtesy of the National Health system. You know the phrase “railroaded into” something? I was railroaded into the abortion.

I awoke from the anesthesia in a recovery room, next to a few other girls in hospital beds. The boyfriend came to visit me later in the day, and sat on my bed. But he couldn’t stop ogling the girl next to me, who wore some kind of sexy baby doll pajamas. I struggled miserably to get his attention. He informed me that a guy we knew had overdosed and died.

Fifty years later, I recall my hurt feelings as if it were yesterday. Why do our painful moments have to cling like this, to be etched so deeply that they can come to life in a flash? Why don’t our happy moments flood our brains like the bad ones? When my Mexican-American mother-in-law was 103 years old, she still recalled the little girl who called her a “beaner” in elementary school, and told me the story again and again.

I am staunchly pro-choice like any normal person, but it occurs to me that at 17, I didn’t have a choice. No one offered me one. I didn’t have the money to take care of myself, and my boyfriend threatened to leave me. I think I should have had a choice, even though I was not equipped for motherhood. It still bothers me.

Many years later, I was unhappily married and having an affair with an amiable stoner who was good at sex and had a lot of free time. I was horrified to find my self pregnant, evidently still a moron about birth control. Having the stoner’s baby was unthinkable. I had a young child at home. And my husband would find out about the affair.

So I went to have an abortion from a doctor who asked me when I showed up, “What’s the matter with you? You look depressed.” Afterwards, I had to get home before my husband returned from work. To my furious contempt, he never noticed that I lied on the couch all evening, barely able to contain my “discomfort” as they say in the medical trade. What a fucking dope. He was the same guy who railroaded me when I was seventeen.

That second time, I was very depressed but not in any doubt about the decision I’d made. I wouldn’t want to imagine a world where I would be forced to have that stoner’s baby. It’s just unthinkable.

Girls and women should have real choices  about whether or not to get pregnant and whether or not to go forward with a pregnancy. It should be their decision alone to make. Ideally, no one would be as stupid or lax about birth control as I was, but things happen. Fetuses aren’t babies and seeds aren’t trees. If the pro-life people would adopt all the world’s unwanted children, disabled or starving or orphaned, then we might take them seriously.

As it is, we all know that the unborn are way more important to them than the born.

Girls, my best advice is to find a means of birth control you can live with, keep some Plan B handy, and stay away from guys who won’t have your back in your worst moments. Wait, also remember to vote sane people into office, or you end up with Gregg Abbot, Kristy “I’m Batshit Crazy” Noem, and Ron DeSantis, who in a better world would all have been aborted before or after the sixth week.

If you have a story you want to share, step right up. xo

The Sanskrit word upeksha means “equanimity, non-attachment, nondiscrimination, even-mindedness, or letting go.” Upa means ‘over,’ and iksh means ‘to look.’ You climb the mountain to be able to look over the whole situation, not bound by one side or the other.

In Buddhism, equanimity (in Pali, upekkha; in Sanskrit, upeksha) is one of the four great virtues (along with compassion, loving kindness, and sympathetic joy) that the Buddha taught his disciples to cultivate.

Equanimity isn’t indifference. It’s a balance that comes from inner stability–remaining centered when surrounded by turmoil. It’s a state of acceptance, but not in the sense of being resigned or defeated. More like being at peace with things as they are.

Does this sound like self help gibberish? I learned the concept from a podcast by an expert on family estrangement. It’s my first podcast! That’s how much the subject weighs on me. Being powerless in a critical aspect of your life is so fucking difficult. It can lead you into a never-ending loop of regret, guilt, anger, remorse, and despair.

I am beginning to see that the best way to approach insoluble situations is to do nothing. Not just do nothing, but to feel nothing. Nothing can be a good choice, and in my interpretation of equanimity, it is essential. Accept what is and let it wash over you. Don’t react to the feelings or urges attendant to helplessness or misery. Just go, Uh-huh, and go about your business.

Until this week, I would have called this approach “denial” and I would lobby hard against it. What’s more pathetic than denial? I am constantly pointing it out and deploring it. It’s part of my Just Admit It worldview. Everyone hates me for this bossy, superior stance but there you go. I want everyone to face their own life, even if it’s a tragedy, and to face up to their demons. I feel it’s their duty, as a human being.

But once you face up to it, why keep suffering? Recognize the truth, evaluate its awfulness, and then stop struggling with it. If you can’t change it, assume a state of equanimity. Say to yourself, My parents are awful, my kid hates me, I am useless, everyone’s crazy…and then return to a state of calm. I think if I practice this enough, it may set me free from my daily torment.

I will aim to only get mad about the things that are fun to be mad at. Bad grammar, hideous denim, and the ex-wife. Also, music awards shows. Did anyone see that stupid American Music Awards the other nigh?? Oh my god, so awful. I guess I should go write an exegesis.

Namaste or whatever.

Dude, chill the fuck out! I know you’re mad, I’m mad too. We’re all mad. You have problems but you’ve misidentified them. It isn’t black people or Jews or immigrants that caused your problems, it’s the lies you’ve been fed your whole life. It’s the old lies of the patriarchy and the new lies spread by your buddies on the internet.

You’re worried about weakness and that’s understandable. You probably had a mean daddy who ridiculed you or hit you, or maybe your daddy wasn’t around. You had trouble making friends and that made you so angry! You felt helpless and you still feel helpless. You want to be the powerful one. You want to be the mean daddy for a change! You want to show the world who’s boss! Fuck those foreigners and niggers and kikes!

You can’t get laid either. You’ve tried being nice and you’ve tried negging. Women won’t give you what you want. It’s just like Mommy. She wouldn’t either. She made you feel like a baby. A helpless baby. But now you’ll get even. You don’t need women anyway, now that you’ve found your buddies online.

You even belong to a group! When you were little, they didn’t pick you for the team or they picked you last. They wouldn’t let you into their clubhouse or tree-house or their little fort. Now you are respected, a person with ideas and guns and backpacks. You are part of a community, a brotherhood. And if you aren’t afraid to die, you can be a hero! All you need is some ammo.

But here’s the thing: You won’t really be a warrior. Shooting at unarmed civilians makes you a pussy, or a cuck, if you prefer. Real warriors run into battle, not mosques or churches or shopping malls. There have been too many of you guys for us to remember your names any more. I can’t even name the guy in Las Vegas, and you’ll probably never come close to his body count.

What you want so desperately is a purpose, a community, and an identity. Your online group may provide a sense of all three, but it’s a sham. The world you imagine will never come about, and if it did, you wouldn’t know how to survive. You spend too much time at your computer. You don’t know how to grow crops or raise cattle or drive a tractor. You can’t get a date, so you won’t be able to reproduce. You wouldn’t be happy without another group to hate, so then what?

You have not thought this through, have you?

Why don’t you join the US Military if you love your country so much? Aren’t the uniforms scary enough? Are you afraid of being in close quarters with men who are bigger and stronger than you? Are you afraid of guns when you’re not the only one who has one? Are you afraid of a meritocracy? Are you lost in situations where memes don’t bring status?

I feel for you. You thought you were entitled to the whole world, as a free white male. You didn’t know that it only works that way for the wealthy class. You didn’t prepare for a shitty job market when you were spending all that time online instead of studying. You nursed your resentment when you should have been learning how to socialize, how to dance, how to make eye contact, and how to laugh at yourself once in a while.

You could still have a real life if you gather your courage enough to move away from your computer. Your buddies will denounce you but they’ll get over it. Later, much later, you’ll see how pathetic they are. And when you see one on TV, in handcuffs, or in a scowling mugshot, you’ll think, Dude, YOU are the problem, not those Mexicans buying school supplies.

At least, that’s my dream for you, b’ezrat hashem, inshallah.

Maybe if you aren’t American, 2017 was about something other than Donald Trump. I can barely imagine that. Here in the US, we wake up every morning in a state of dread. What did he do now? Who has he insulted? What inch of progress has he dragged back by a yard?

Some of you are able to go about your day without watching the news, and I envy you. I know I could wait until evening to find out the latest breach of decency but I want to get my hit asap, while it’s still fresh. I want to see the modulated horror on the pundits’ faces. I want to see them try to contain their disgust. I like knowing that I’m not alone in this.

My personal life seems inconsequential, and it literally is, more and more. I have lost friends to distance or apathy or Because cunt. My community is a long way from where I used to live, and I’ve stopped driving. I feel like a shut-in even though I do get out occasionally. I’m not expecting anything to happen, like a new job or relationship or project or vacation. I’m just coasting.

I’m trying to learn how to stop ruminating about the same old shit. Walking backwards is supposed to help. I’m taking probiotics and calcium when I can remember them. But in general, I don’t feel present in my own life.

Politics is another matter.

The Trump situation is an all-consuming and immediate vortex of fear and rage. Why can’t anyone make it stop? Why has the Republican party gone crazy en masse? Why aren’t they terrified of that fucker destroying the world in a crazed nuclear strike, just to distract us from his Russian business ties? Why do we have to go around embarrassed by his blustering stupidity and childish outbursts? Why do we have to see that fucking hair????

In 2018, I hope to march against my government to show solidarity with sane people. I think that’s my only plan.

Last week I had a three-hour phone conversation with a dear friend who told me that meditation would cure my depression. We both grew frustrated but we kept at it. He insisted that his depressed friends had found relief through meditation. The ones who didn’t were to blame for not trying hard enough. If only everyone would listen to him! he exclaimed. At one point, I sneered that I was further than ever from wanting to meditate.

He was proselytizing because he believed he had the answer. I resisted his belief-system because, in his words, I can’t surrender. Depression is complicated. Surrendering to a higher power is just not for me. I will surrender to medication or trans-cranial electric stimulation or a guiding philosophy that makes life less painful.

I reminded him that the universe is indifferent to us, clearly. I mean, it’s obviously not benevolent. He found this line of thinking exasperating. “You’re just like Max!” he said. And despite everything, I was proud to hear that. I’m going to drink a toast to Max tonight, to his beautiful stubborn soul and his loving heart.

Goodbye to 2017 and the horse it rode in on.

Last night, I was trying not to think of the things that were bothering me (largely Trump, along with some other stuff) when the word “stigmata” popped into my head. I don’t know why. I’ve always liked the sound of the word and the actual phenomenon too.

Just say it aloud: STIGMATA! It’s a winner every time.

So I googled stigmata and forgot all about my troubles (and yours.)

St. Gemma Galgani, above, was a real pain in the ass, apparently. I guess it’s part of being a saint. She also levitated.

Stigmata can occur in regular people, ahem, and here’s what an expert says:

History has shown that the stigmata can occur in a wide variety of persons, circumstances and conditions. While the vast majority of recipients have been women (90%), and most of them religious nuns, it has occurred numerous times throughout the centuries in a number of lay men and women, single and married. From the 1980’s to today for example it has (allegedly) occurred in the young married Catholic woman named Myrna Nazzour of Damascus, Syria and also in a retired married Catholic man from Michigan named Irving “Francis” Houle who died in 2009.

Uh-oh. I don’t like that “stigmatics” are usually women. It sounds suspiciously like fibromyalgia, only messier. But here’s something interesting, from the same expert:

… in regards to the blood that comes forth from the stigmatised wounds, this writer has found that in almost every case that I have researched, there is reported an accompanying sweet, flowery odor that emanates from the blood itself.

Whoa. That is worrisome, if you know what I mean.

Therese Neumann, below, was a total mess. She suffered and suffered and suffered.

I’m beginning to think these “stigmatists” are a teeny bit masochistic. Sister Consolata Betrone wrote “It is my fate to die in little pieces”. Sadly, she died of tuberculosis instead.

Rhoda Wise, below, had the usual hand stigmata but was also blessed with the “crown of thorns” bleeding from the forehead.

I know you’ve probably had enough but just let me sneak in a picture of Teresa Musco:

There is so much to learn, and marvel at, about stigmata. At one point in my research, I couldn’t help but laugh, as Oscar Wilde said about the death of Little Nell.  Laughing is good! We need all the laughs we can get. And in case you’re worried that I’m losing my mind, I wrote about stigmata back in 2007. So there.

I would almost call it a guilty pleasure, but since I’m not Catholic, it’s a guilt-free pleasure. If I go to hell, I’ll let you know.

Remember going on field trips when you were a kid? It was a chance to get out the classroom, and it would an adventure. Not always a good one, but a diversion from the routine of school.

Last week I found a Botanica just a few miles away, bit it was like entering another universe.

This was a real, authentic Botanica, not the one in Hollywood that sells candles to hispters. It was dark and dusty, crammed wall-to-wall with weird packets of herbs, oils, religious statues, Santeria supplies, trays of amulets and charms and some shit you didn’t even want to know what it was.

There was a girl behind the counter in full cola uniform and manner. She might have been Filipino, and she didn’t speak much Spanish. She had died blonde hair with long black roots, heavy winged eyeliner, and a tattoo in gang writing down in her cleavage,

Her name was Jenny, and she watched me ogle the stuff behind the counter. I told her I was looking for something to cure a friend’s illness, instead of admitting to being a nosy Jew on a cultural field trip.

She asked me if I believed in “that stuff” and I said “nah,” immediately outing myself by mistake.

We talked for a bit and she told me she had a month old baby. It turned out that her husband was in jail, BUT IT WASN’T HIS FAULT.

Of course it wasn’t his fault! I watch Lock-Up, I’m not an idiot!

She told me his story and I narrowed my eyes like Nancy Grace and asked: “Who threw the first punch?”

It was the Other Guy, not her husband! But somehow the other guy’s wife, a crazy bitch, told the cops that bla bla bla bla.

Poor Jenny! Only twenty-two.  She was watching the counter for her husband’s mother, who owns the shop and gives readings and ‘cleansings’ in a back room.

Jenny revealed that her baby was asleep in the back of the shop. She insisted on showing me the baby girl, who has some stupid name like Kaylee or something.

I cooed at the baby appreciatively. A fat little girl appeared and spoke to Jenny. She seemed to know her way around the store and might have been the innocent husband’s little sister.

The little girl fingered the tiny evil-eye bracelets and Hamsa charms in front of me. I told her that I love Hamsa’s, which actually isn’t true,  but I wanted to engage her in conversation.

“Good for you,” she answered coolly.

What a fat little bitch, I thought to myself.

I am thinking of going back to get the owner to give me a spiritual cleansing in the back room. I am completely serious.

Plus I want to hear more about Jenny and her predicament.

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In my 20s, a hundred years ago, I remember enjoying newspaper ads for grocery stores that said “And For Our Jewish Friends,” with photos of Hanukkah or Passover food. I enjoyed what I felt was the discreet racism of “Our Jewish Friends” and probably inferred a silent “You kikes!”

I thought this Jewish specificity was a thing of the past but nope, the clickbait above popped up yesterday.

So where are the Hottest Presbyterian Woman Under 40?  I couldn’t find them, but I did find fifty more Hot Jews, including many names I’ve never heard before plus Sarah Silverman, the poster girl for attractive Jewishness.

If you google the phrase “And for our Jewish Friends,” it crops up everywhere, usually a polite afterthought to an Easter or Christmas wish. “Hey Jews, look, we’re not excluding you!”

When will America single out Muslims and Buddhists in their holiday greetings or hot babe galleries? Until that happens, I resent the shout out to Jews.

Fuck you, Dominant American Culture! I’m not your friend. I don’t even believe in god. But here’s how I served some pastries at my housewarming party last week.

L’chaim and Merry Christmas, inshallah!

Moss is a design store with a great online shop full of stuff to drool over or laugh at or both. I love this necklace by Katja Prins, called Bound by Blood.   It “represents prayer necklaces from differing religions, and is stained in red to represent the blood that has been shed in the name of religion.” Amen.

What I really want from Moss is this set of exquisite dolls, called “les bebes du monde.” In fact, I need them.   Only three months till my birthday!