Words...

Something ... I am not even sure what ... got me to thinking about my father.  Too many thoughts.  Confusing thoughts.  So, I pulled out Apollo 13 and watched it again.  Watching movies is the best time that I shared with him.  I needed the distraction.

Rumblings, still, in my heart and mind about what happened in that game neighborhood.  Several days later, what happened still makes no sense to me, but at least I understand better that I was not really a factor in what happened, more of a bystander.  The male who made such a production of kicking me out, shouting in all caps he was never leaving, left and is back with the original members of the neighborhood in another named almost the same as the original group.  So much unnecessary cruelty.  Why didn't the original folk merely tell those who joined later that they wanted to be alone and go off quietly into the night instead of trying to ruin the game for the players who joined later?

A lot of what happened was set up on Facebook.  Needless to say, my opinion of the health factor of being on Facebook has not improved in the least.

Still struggling with thoughts and feelings about my father and lingering hurt over what unfolded on a  game that I played for fun, I took my upsettedness out on the servant's closet yesterday, pulling out all the linens and refolding them.  Frankly, it had gotten a bit messy in there.  As with all my re-organization efforts, I took the opportunity to evaluate everything in the closet and found two sets of twin sheets and two blankets to donate.  The sheets were the ones I replaced with the botanical sets in preparation for the GRAND VISIT coming in December.  They are actually decades old and I thought about merely throwing them away, but, although thin, they are still usable and the non-profit helping homeless folk into permanent housing wants them.

In my linen count, every bed in the house has two sets of sheets for it, save for the two sofa sleepers (sofa and sofa chair in the basement living space) and my own bed.  I have four sets for my bed and there is only one set for each of the sofa sleepers.  I feel like two sets is a bit much, but I figured it is important to be able to change the sheets without having to do an emergency wash on all the beds when the house is full of visitors.

I practiced Becky's fitted sheet folding method, a bit unsuccessfully.  If you were to peer at the bed linen piles, you could immediately spot the ones she folded for me verses mine.  Part of why I tackled the closet was that I did the laundry from Becky's visit and had bed linens to add to the crocked and falling piles on the shelves, along with a blanket that had not yet been returned to the closet shelves.  How odd is it that I felt significantly better once order had been restored to the chaos of the closet??  

Walking by this morning, the sight of those neat and orderly shelves was quite soothing.  The rest of the day, however, has been spent on the bathroom floor with beach whale syndrome.  My abdomen is so swollen that any movement hurts and the Zofran hasn't touched the nausea.  My innards have not really been cooperating with my existence of late ... almost as if they are trying to drive me to despair.  I am uncomfortable on the hard floor, of course, but the bed and the couch and the GREEN chair all make me bend too much ... hurt too much.

Lying here has me thinking about some of the news I have read lately.  I grow rather irked whenever I see an article—and there are plenty—about how the hack of the cheating web service Ashley Madison is ruining lives.  First, the hackers had nothing to do with "ruining lives," since those participating in infidelity are the ones making the choices that have led to changes in the lives of those affected by the hack.  Seriously, the only one responsible for the pain and agony and shock many are experiencing, the danger to job and reputation, are the ones who are cheated.

I read an article that had an interview with a married woman who had relationships with eight married men and is worried about her own marriage and her job, blaming the hackers.  I really was dumbfounded.  Are we so deluded and egotistical as a society now that there is absolutely no responsibility for the fallout from the release of information by those who cheated?

What absolutely staggers me is that anyone, any single person in this day and age, actually believed that information would be permanently deleted.  What happens on the Internet is never private.  Information transmitted and/or stored is information accessible to replication and theft.  Look at Radio Shack.  That corporation fundamentally believes that all of its customer data is its own possession, nay it own asset to be sold to its advantage in the dissolution of its company.  You buy something from a company and that purchase and all of your contact information is now its property.

To me, one of the creepiest things about the Internet is that if I search for an item, such as a jersey robe, the ads in websites I visit later feature jersey robes.  Even without making a purchase, my interests and personal information are captured and used for marketing and profiteering.  Folk on Facebook who wail and protect about privacy information are deluded if they think that any of their interests and personal information is not being used by that company for marketing and profiteering.

Having had my credit card be a part of a hack at The Home Depot and one at Target and my personal information be a part of a hack at three times now between insurance companies and insurance billing companies, I live my life on the premise that my information is not secure.  I check my credit, credit card, banking, and social security activity on a regular basis.  I also will never use a debit card again, so at to minimize exposure to my liquid assets.  At least a credit card is one layer of protection between my bank and the rest of the world with all its nefarious folk out there.

Anyway, the thought that remains about all that is the idea that lives have been "ruined" by the hack.  I have wondered if lives really can be "ruined" ... if that is the right word to use.  I mean, "ruin" is defined as the destruction or disintegration of something.  Wouldn't that mean that a life ruined is a life that is destroyed (to end the existence of) ... a life ended?

Marriages might be destroyed, be ended, but not by the hack.  Affairs cannot be exposed if they do not occur in the first place!  But the lives in those ended marriages?  Are they "ruined"?

I think about my own life ... and that wonderful episode of Life, "Serious Control Issues."  Charlie Crews, played by Damien Lewis, shares his wisdom with a teenage boy who had been held captive for 12 years:  He still had a life to live, even if his life didn't look like everyone else's.  Such compassion and insight can be found in tiny moments of that series.  The character's life was not "ruined" by the terrible injustice and harm inflicted upon him, although I think those who are using the word these days might disagree.

I think the better word to use is "wound."  Lives are wounded by the choices and activities of those using the Ashley Madison web service.  Wounds change lives, inhibit the well-being of lives, and can be a contributing factor to the ending of a life.

Lives are deeply wounded by sexual abuse, but they are not ruined.  That is the stance taken by experts Bass and Davis in The Courage to Heal.   Unless you are dead, you are a survivor of sexual abuse, not a victim.

In my opinion, words matter and folk should think carefully about the words they choose.  I know that everyone, myself included, speaks with a certain freedom or carelessness with the words they use when with close family and friends.  But when writing articles for the world, when writing with authority about a subject, words should be chosen carefully.  For that matter, when commenting on articles, words should be chosen carefully.

Anyway, lying here, writhing, I have wondered what word I would use to describe my life post dysautonomia diagnosis.  I think some might call it ruined.  I think I might think it ruined.  But, as Charlie Crews would tell me, it is still a life to be lived.

I suppose the question is:  How do I live it?