Tue
12
Jan
2021
Ego Credit
If you ever see the phrase 'scrotum to the podium'...I coined that shit!
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Wed
12
Aug
2020
See you on the other side...
People are almost always surprised at my tight and slightly too long hugs.
They don't know I'm saying goodbye forever.
Each time.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Tue
11
Aug
2020
After the visit
After you visit with people, as you say your goodbyes,
look them in the eyes or give them a hug, think to yourself:
"this.could.be.the.last.time."
Savor that look or hug.
It could be the last time.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Tue
11
Aug
2020
Be here
If you know someone will die today, would you be an asshole to them?
If you know someone will die today, would you yell in anger or try to talk in understanding?
If you know YOU will die today, would you be quick to be anything but sincere and kind?
WHY WAIT TILL YOU ARE ABOUT TO DIE?
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Sat
08
Aug
2020
Healing
Whatever path to emotional healing we choose,
where we end up is at
acceptance.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Fri
12
Jun
2020
Talk to them
It's traumatic to learn that the society you live in, at minimum, is suspicious of you.
It hurts to the core.
Would rather have had it explained than to have learned outside my door.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Mon
11
May
2020
Supremacy
Fear of being inferior in some form (physical attributes, cultural depth & strength, employment).
Fear of not having enough, which breeds jealousy that manifests as subjugation, condescension, thievery, exploitation, elimination of the perceived competition.
Fear of no longer being the dominant ones in most continents across this globe, which threatens their state of being/living.
This is a description of a racist/supremacist. Many don't have the natural intelligence to see through their miseducation.
Know this: anger, jealousy, subjugation, overcompensation, condescension are all expressions of fear. When you see these emotions, know you are looking at fear. Choose your action/reaction,
wisely.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Mon
23
Mar
2020
Grandmas
Grandma made the best coffee.
That shit was pure diabetes in a cup of heaven.
Iris Shaimara Rosado
Mon
11
Nov
2019
Fear
Fear is the cause of so much disease.
Stress (aka, worry), anger, anxiety, are all faces of fear.
Fear is a killer.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Sun
03
Nov
2019
Environmental Measures
He lifted his head from his pack. The black garbage bag, holding aluminum cans to exchange, set in front of him. He had been sleeping on the cold cement of the store entryway, far back, near the
door, in order to hide from everyone, especially cops. Anyone walking by would think there was a bag of garbage near the door. The smell had woken him up. He’d been smelling it around 2 a.m.
every morning for the last two weeks. A sort of chlorine smell tinged with rotten egg. It started when the new fracking facility was built at the edge of town. The town had protesters for a few
weeks but that had died down. He wondered what it was they did there since it wasn’t only the smell that woke him up but the dull ache between his eyes that came with it. He laid his head down
again and covered his nose with his coat sleeve. The ratty coat smelled better than the air and helped filter the stink from reaching his nose. He breathed through the coat fabric and fell into a
light sleep, the dull ache a painful monotony.
Four blocks away from the storefront, were neighborhoods of houses. He sat with his can of beer that was quickly warming up from his large hand. That dull ache was back. It pounded between his
eyes and he couldn’t get rid of it. Over the last two weeks, he’d tried aspirin, acetaminophen, ibuprofen; nothing worked. He drank more these last few days, trying to take the edge off the pain
enough to sleep. Not that sleep was necessary. As a retired cop, he no longer needed to keep a schedule but his wife, sleeping in the bedroom, would like to enjoy the time they now had. He’d like
that, too, except, this damned headache kept him awake. He pushed the chair into the reclining position and closed his eyes, setting the almost empty can on the side table. His mind couldn’t
ignore the pain enough to sleep. A half hour went by and the dull pain was almost a banging in his head. He got up and walked through the kitchen and down the hall to the bedroom. His wife was
laying on her side, asleep. In the closet, on the side shelf, was the lock box. He pulled it down and opened it. He should keep it locked but never did. Inside, his companion for thirty years,
five days a week, his old revolver, was sitting on top of the cloth he regularly used to clean it. He pulled out the gun, turned around, looked at her sleeping and shot her in the head. He aimed
the barrel under his chin, and pulled the trigger.
Across town, in another residential neighborhood, not as nice as a retired cop could afford, he paced the living room. He and his wife had just bought this house six months ago. His son loved the
neighborhood and already had several friends. The job was a town over at the state penitentiary; a short 15 minutes away. He worked four ten hour days and was now on his three day weekend. He
paced, his mind racing, the dull ache between his eyes seeming to get worse. Two weeks of this. He was coming to the end of his ability to ignore it or work through it. One of the COs he worked
with noted that he seemed like he needed his weekend since everyone had noticed how short tempered he’d become. He paced. He hadn’t even taken off his holster much less his uniform. His wife came
out of the bedroom, down the hall, her eyes squinting as she reached the doorway into the living room. His son was asleep in his bedroom that was next to theirs. The living room windows had
shades rolled down and thick curtains that were kept closed. He’d recently demanded that. His wife looked at him, half hidden in the hall doorway and quietly asked him to come to bed. He smirked.
If he could do that, would he be pacing? He paced. She waited a few minutes and moved to go back down the hall. She stopped, turned back, her mouth open as she started to say something and he
looked at her. In one smoothly practiced move, he pulled his gun out, shot her directly between the eyes, then put the barrel in his mouth. The pain was gone.
©2019 E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Sun
04
Nov
2018
Choice
A family member forgot to set up a weekly visit with me. I got angry (an expression of pain).
I could just as easily have accepted that they forgot, didn't and won't apologize, decide that I'm worthy in my eyes (no matter what), release that they won't meet my expectation and know that it is not my burden. In other words, I could just as easily choose contentment through acceptance.
I am still choosing anger, aka, my pain.
We can take any experience we have and choose the pain or accept that it is and then it was. Acceptance of the 'what is', is key for it to become 'then it was'.
We can decide how we feel about it, what we will focus on in the experience (pain or understanding self/others) and whether we will continue to review it, reverberating the pain with repetition or accept 'the what is'.
We can decide to take responsibility for the parts that are ours and release the part that is the other person's. We can also decide to confront but will have to know our expectations will need managing as we are almost surely to be disappointed.
In the end, we can choose to ensure, that no matter what we decide (pain or release), we are kind to ourselves. It's part of the processing and healing.
This is what it means to choose joy. This is what it means to focus on contentment. Acceptance is not a denial but a choice--a method of dealing with whatever unpleasantness is presented at our feet at any given moment and leaving it there.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Thu
11
Oct
2018
A Wisp
Busy doing nothing but picking lint off the blanket across her knees. She had tried calling her niece earlier, but, like the last twenty times she had called, her niece didn't pick up. The phone
just rang and didn’t kick over to voice mail. It was so damned odd.
Her life had become pretty small. Occasional calls to her niece, less occasional calls to her son, and quick exchanges with other carriers made up her social interactions. She delivered bundles
of newspapers to stores in the area. The only job she could find at her age.
She had tried searching for over a year. She’d quickly gotten used to walking in and seeing the glances at the sagging neck, the beginning of jowls and the gray hair. After only six interviews
over that year, she had given up. She had started the delivery route over two and a half years ago. She was fine with it; it would do.
She had moved all her things out of storage soon after starting the route. The boxes, accommodated along walls and filling the corners of rooms, created a good base for a hoarder’s paradise. She
was always so tired after lifting, throwing bundles and driving, that organizing, cleaning and letting go of memories was beyond her physical or emotional capability. She, continually, ached all
over.
Her days were wake up at midnight, drink coffee, smoke cigarettes, pick up and deliver the bundles, come home, shower, smoke cigarettes, then sleep to start the cycle again upon awakening. She
tried to ignore her feeling a bit lost, a bit depressed, a bit dead inside.
He entered the apartment. The front door opened only so far and the air was stuffy. The cats were gone. The local humane society had two new residents. The litter boxes were there, full and
odorous. He walked into the hallway. It was filled with furniture, boxes and a solid layer of dust. There was a table loaded with two bird cages and various planting pots. Next to that was an old
desk, worn boxes piled three high and two across. He walked into the living room from the entry hallway to the only visual rest, a small bookcase filled with books, two deep on some shelves.
Although filled, there was order to the bookcase, unlike the rest of the apartment.
As he stepped into the room further, he stopped. His eyes and mind became overwhelmed. Every corner had boxes, things piled on top of boxes, papers on top of things, boxes on tables, things under
tables. There were narrow areas where she could walk from the well worn spot on the sofa, to the alarm clock near the window across the room and to the kitchen on the opposite side.
He wandered through the apartment. He wondered how she had let it get so bad. He wondered how he had let his life become something that he didn’t share with her. How had he let her life become
something she didn’t share with him. He walked through and wondered.
Tears came to his eyes as he remembered how funny she could be. The bittersweetness of each tear also captured the days that would become weeks of almost catatonic depression for her. They
captured the pain, the fear and the walking on eggshells that had been his younger years with her. She worked but it had taken everything out of her and she would come home to sit, smoke
cigarettes and sit. She would barely speak. When she did, it was usually yelling and criticism followed up with apologies. It was tragically pathetic for the both of them.
He breathed deeply of the dusty, stale smoke air, lost in his memories, and stared at the depression on the couch. It looked almost as if she’d just gotten up and walked into the kitchen.
There was that draft again. There had been these odd drafts going through the apartment, lately. Ignoring the chill, she walked into the kitchen and opened the fridge. She stared at the hard
edged chunk of cheese, the half-eaten apple, the floppy carrots in the vegetable bin, swung the fridge door closed and went to sit again.
She wondered if this would be the way she would spend the rest of her life. Quietly, barely speaking to anyone, working the route to eventually retire. She guessed that would be alright. It had
been her life for almost three years, now. Made sense to continue.
As she sat, she wondered why everything seemed so quiet over the last few days. She lived near a farm and would hear the trucks go by on the narrow road, throughout the day. She hadn’t heard the
trucks in over a week. She rarely looked out her windows but when she did, the road was always empty.
He looked around one more time and saw the fridge was open. He didn’t remember it being opened when he arrived. He opened it further to find desiccated cheese, a shriveled apple and wrinkled
carrots. He firmly shut the fridge door. He decided he would not go through all the boxes, papers, things. He had no time to deal with all of it. He had two days before he had to fly back for
meetings that couldn’t be rescheduled. He decided it was all going to the dump.
He had finalized all the arrangements: junk removers would be in to clear out all of the boxes, the accumulation of a life, and a cleaning service had been hired to remove the odors. In two
weeks, he would fly back for her funeral.
©2018 E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Sun
02
Sep
2018
Natural Intelligence
Education can get you only so far if you don't have the intelligence to practice it.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Mon
19
Feb
2018
Base instincts
Critical thinking has become an art (how fucking crazy is that?)
and it's being lost (behold our downfall).
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Wed
07
Feb
2018
A line in the sand
If a compromise requires subservience, it is no longer a compromise but enslavement.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Wed
04
Oct
2017
Somewhat true fable...
Loosely true story dressed as a fable:
The grandfather sat in his armchair, looking out the window. Sometimes, when the fog was just right, his mind would wander back to those worn brick streets. The hiding, the danger, the resistance to complete insanity. The resistance to the Nazis. His grandson, walking in and plopping himself in the armchair opposite, brought him back to the present.
"Gramps, I am confused about something."
"Tell me what's going on."
"You know I'm active with a lot of activist and equal rights groups, right?" Gramps nodded.
"I invited my friend from my poli sci class to the Women's March and he said no. He told me that he's in complete support of this president and he's not going to
march against him."
Gramps looked down at the floor and asked, "How do you feel about that?"
His grandson looked down at the same spot on the floor, "I'm confused. In many ways, he is really great to hang with. I just don't know if I can be around him, now
that I know he's okay with someone who has shown he's racist."
Gramps looked across at his grandson's face. He was about the same age as his grandson is now when he entered the resistance.
"This president has not spoken out against several of these hate groups. These groups do not like Jews. They also don't like any Brown, Black or Native people. I
don't care what your gay friend does in his bedroom but they don't like the gay people, either. I fought in the resistance. I, in your situation, would not think it's good to have such a
friend."
His grandson met his grandfather's gaze. "Integrity is always a choice, isn't it, Gramps."
Gramps smiled.
©2017 E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Thu
13
Jul
2017
Matrix Check
Separation from nature through belief, expressed in lifestyle
has produced our current state.
How's that working for us?
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Wed
24
May
2017
Watched
She flipped through the channels, dissatisfied with everything she watched in the three seconds she took to assess the screen. It was sticky hot and it was 10 p.m. She had two fans going and her
bedroom window was open about five inches. It was all it could go. She had hammered nails into all the window sashes to ensure that they could only be opened so far by an intruder. Even so, it
still made her uneasy, sometimes, to have the window open.
She heard the rustle outside again. Odd, since there was absolutely no wind and hadn’t been any for the last two days. Maybe it was a neighbor’s pet going through the bushes. Again, odd, she
thought, as it was 10 p.m. and she knew her neighbors to have their animals in well before then. It was a coyote neighborhood. Pets weren’t safe outside any time and especially at night.
She ignored the rustle and continued flipping through the channels.
“For God’s Sake! Just watch anything!!”
Her breath caught for a second then she let out a scream heard across two streets. Lights went on.
“Oh jeez! Now ya done it!”
She screamed again.
“OH MY GOD! SHUT THE FUCK UP! ALL I WANTED TO DO WAS WATCH TV!”
With this, her mind jumbled. Seriously, what the fuck?
“SERIOUSLY!!!! WHAT THE FUCK???” she yelled.
“Dude! I’m homeless! I just wanted to pretend I have a TV for a little while. I was just hanging out, leaning on this bush. Why did you have to fuck it up? Shit! The cops are gonna come! Half the
neighborhood is awake, now!”
“I’m sorry!” It flitted through her thoughts how ridiculous it was she was apologizing to him, when he was the TV peeping tom.
A minute of quiet and then, “Naw. I’m sorry. I scared the crap out of you. I sort of forgot myself.”
“It’s okay.” Again, the ridiculousness of comforting the offender made her thinking feel a bit wonky.
The phone rang and it was her neighbor. She assured them she was okay and had been startled by a movie. She apologized several times for scaring them. Their lights went off and, soon, the lights
at a couple of other houses did, too.
“I suppose it’s okay if you stay, BUT, I’m not watching just anything. You shut up or move on.”
Another minute of quiet and then, “Deal! Thanks!” She ignored the slurp of liquid that followed.
©2017 E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Tue
31
Jan
2017
State of the Union
This is what it looks like to me:
I, being of brown skin with the ability to speak a second language, am not welcome in what has been, for at least part of my heritage, the only home I've known (Indigenous).
I, being of brown skin with the ability to speak a second language, am not welcome in what has been, for at least part of my heritage, the home I've known since 1500. Yuppers, England and the rest of Europe were scrambling to get to the 'new world' while the Spaniards were already invading.
I, being of brown skin with the ability to speak a second language, am not welcome in what has been, for at least part of my heritage, the home I've known since I was brought from Africa in the 1500s.
I, being of brown skin with the ability to speak a second language, am not welcome in what has been a land I've fought for, a land I've helped create into an economic giant, a land that was mine before it was anyone else's.
Those of the mindset that brown doesn't belong here need to read history. Those of the mindset that brown doesn't belong here need to move back to their respective countries of origin. Or texas.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Mon
30
May
2016
Meant to be
Everything happens for a reason. It's called our thought processes.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Tue
26
Apr
2016
Kind world
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Tue
29
Mar
2016
Different take
Nature is trying very hard to make us succeed,
but nature does not depend on us.
We are not the only experiment.
R. Buckminster Fuller
Fri
22
Jan
2016
Subconscious control
What backstories do we tell ourselves daily? Let's mind our backstories. They produce our future front line.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Sat
28
Nov
2015
The menial
Blessed and astute are those who can find art and joy in the menial, thereby transforming it into the extraordinary.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Fri
09
Oct
2015
Naturally
My breasts do not diminish my natural intelligence nor my self-inflicted education, unlike how viewing said breasts seems to diminish the male psyche.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Fri
18
Sep
2015
Simple
Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself,
in your way of thinking.
Marcus Aurelius
Thu
10
Sep
2015
Tree wisdom
For me, trees have always been the most penetrating preachers.
In their highest boughs the world rustles, their roots rest
in infinity; but they do not lose themselves there.
Hermann Hesse
Mon
17
Aug
2015
Opportunities
Though no one can go back and make a brand new start,
anyone can start from now and make a brand new ending.
Carl Bard
Wed
01
Jul
2015
Miracles
Collective consciousness: we are capable of
turning any tide.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Fri
19
Jun
2015
Idealist
I'm an idealist. I don't know where I'm going
but I'm on my way.
Carl Sandburg
Fri
29
May
2015
Consciously
Live, so you do not have to look back and say: 'God, how I have wasted my life.'
Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
Mon
18
May
2015
The nature of good
And this, our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones,
and good in everything.
William Shakespeare
Tue
12
May
2015
Time
We can remember that thought is controllable. We can learn to consciously view time as the only real currency we own.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Mon
20
Apr
2015
Enjoy now
Never put off till tomorrow, the book you can read today.
Holbrook Jackson
Sat
04
Apr
2015
Feelings
Emotions are not predicated by others' actions but by perception. Choose your perception and illicit your emotion.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Wed
01
Apr
2015
Decisions, decisions...
Within our minutes, days, years, lives, we can choose to focus on what is missing or what is available. We can then choose how to feel about either one. If there is a perception of something missing, we can be hopeful that there is something to fill the gap or frustrated that the component is not there. If the perception is of having something available, we can choose to feel grateful about the abundance or frustrated that it's not enough. We choose
all the levels of sentience and attitude about our
minutes, days, years, lives.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras
Wed
25
Mar
2015
Tit for tat
I have found that if you love life, life will
love you back.
Arthur Rubinstein
Sat
14
Mar
2015
Deeds
Thought is deed. It has ramifications, a reaction, a result. Affirm thought through physical deed but do not underestimate
the power of thought.
E. Rodriguez y Nogueras