I was thinking...

Ghost by Jessica Muni The house was dark except for the tiny stage-light colors shining from the family's internet of things, situated all over from the television room to the bathroom. This made it a trick to walk, since each little light didn't offer much revelation in the dark of a minefield of clothes, toys, and papers the two parents were too tired to care about by bedtime. The man of the house, Roger, was the one gently toeing through the shady minefield to the bathroom, with careful steps and careful thoughts in his periphery. As Roger was walking to the bathroom, he glanced through a window, absent of any reason to do so. Between yawning and turning his head to the bathroom door, he paused and reversed his last step. He double-checked what he thought he saw through the window in the backyard, and his uncertainty became certain. Out on the lawn, lit by muted floodlights from the garage, was the figure of a girl in a long white dress. She had long black hair...

Gun violence, especially a mass shooting, is quickly attributed to violence in media, particularly video games, by politicians. Since the logic of those political figures seems to be if something violent happens then it must be the result of something the perpetrator witnessed in a form of media, then why is that same logic not applied to sexual misconduct and sexual exploitation in media? Why does pornography get a free pass after every new report of influential people committing sexual atrocities? From teachers and parents to celebrities of every sort, I’ve never seen an angry Republican or Democrat stand over a pulpit and vehemently point the finger at the pornographic material being to blame for a person’s sexual assault, no matter their age.  The analogy seems to be clear: if violence in media leads to violent behavior, then sexual misconduct in media leads to sexual misconduct. No, I don’t have any figures to back that up, statistically, however, as a layperson ...

There's a myriad (or There's myriad, if you're a cave-dweller) of evidence that dwellers of every kind are capable of creating issues far beyond what they were given at birth. I mean, I've got a subscription, I keep getting so many issues. What I want to convey is not that people imagine their issues. I know I don't. What I'm saying is people can make decisions, outside of illicit drugs and what not of course, to incubate greater symptoms than need be. It's often told to me that I tend to think deeply. I wonder how much more normal a life I would live if I didn't, though. It's my experience that you can stay deep for too long, and what drowns is a simple understanding of life. But, I've been on the surface, long since, and I think I'll take the deep.

It's a challenge to know exactly how you're affecting the people around you, especially with a diagnosable mental condition. As someone who has been thrice diagnosed with Bipolar disorder (II to be exact, since I didn't get there until the sequel came out), I have first-hand experience with this conundrum. What happens, for me, is I think I exist just swell of my own accord. It's only after I see the reaction on people's faces, or what is being said to me in response of something I've said or done, that I see there's some discrepency between my behavior and the comfort of the people around me. Consider the storm cloud. The weather is just being weather, at all times. When a storm cloud forms, the weather is unaware that that is a problem for anyone, and doesn't think to consider it'll affect anything. It's just being weather. However, when the storm cloud starts to rain, when the wind starts to blow, when trees lose branches, when stree...

We should be far more outraged about certain things than we are. I'm not saying we should blow things out of proportion, like politics or movies based on comic books, but we need to say something about companies who make junk food and drink getting away with giving the consumer less, but making us pay more. Thin sandwich cookies? What, did they run out of frosting? Is there a shortage of fake dairy and powdered preservatives, or is no one willing to churn that soft poison anymore? Tiny soda cans? Not only tiny cans, but fewer cans per case?! Are you kidding me? Is the unit price for these things up because the inedible material is doubled? Have the plants all shut down, so they have to supplement a lack of non-food with metal and plastic? We're paying more for hamburgers than ever before, but the patties have slinked inside the standard bun like they're ashamed at how much they cost, now. What's more, or less, is if you want something with actual value...