Confrontation
Dec. 15th, 2021 12:04 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kimberlysteeleI have slow-reaction syndrome. I don’t do well with confrontation because I usually don’t realize I am being confronted. For instance, over the weekend I went to the UPS Store to drop off a pre-paid package. In an ideal world, I would have waited in line, gone up to the counter, and handed the nice young man or woman my package. Once they scanned my package, the young person would hand me a receipt and say “There you go, have a nice day, ma’am” and I would have been on my merry way. Instead, as I stood in line this weekend at the UPS Store, I was making pleasant chit-chat with the masked customers who were packed like sardines beside me (so much for social distancing) and a voice rang over the customers’ heads.
With that epithet, I about-faced and walked out of the store, never to return again.
I barely realized what had happened until I got to my car outside the store. That’s the problem with delayed-reaction syndrome. I had been on autopilot while in the store. It’s much like being in shock. I find being confronted extremely unpleasant, and my reality tends to go fuzzy and milky while it’s happening, like some kind of protective buffer, only to re-focus and crash afterwards.
My first emotion upon getting into my car was vitriolic anger. Dealing appropriately with my anger, I am convinced, is part of my karma in this lifetime. My anger isn’t normal and never has been normal. Maybe it is because it doesn’t set in right away until I realize what has happened; honestly I am not sure, but my anger is never proportionate to the situation. It is always excessive. To be honest, it would not bother me if a terrible fate befell Miss Mask. I won’t go into detail — you can read my novels for that — but I could easily watch as Miss Mask suffered without lifting a finger to help her. The main difference now is I don’t get busy wishing harm on her. The old me would have wished harm on her. The old me would have had more than the usual amount of success achieving the desired end: it’s easy to think harm in to being, or at least it is for me. Nowadays, I let the gods sort that out, and that does require a form of patience I didn’t used to possess.
As we near the holidays, we pass into a second year where many of us have acted as human firewalls of will standing between loved ones who want to endanger other loved ones with experimental MRNA injections. How many of us have lost good friends, spouses, and relatives to injection madness? I recently found out that a friend of a friend got her first injection while four weeks pregnant. This person had every opportunity to obtain real information about the dangers of the Covid injections. She will probably get another injection and a booster as per the “rules”. Knowing what we do about pregnant women and the shots, if she brings the child to term without any complications, it will be a genuine miracle. Another has withheld the company of a grandchild from his grandparents because they aren’t willing to jab and booster up. The grandchild has received at least two shots and will likely be getting boosters soon. Every day I hear of a new and sickening way of excluding normal people like myself from society. In Austria, the ones who refuse are prevented from working or shopping, just like Jews who didn’t have the right papers in 1943. In Australia, they are shunted off to internment camps. In Canada, they are being fired and forced onto the dole.
At every turn, the socially anxious are being turned out into the open arena of confrontation. We are in the Coliseum and it is trial by fire. I would like to be one of those people who just blows it off, who laughs at Karen and doesn’t make much of her bad intentions. Instead, I have to suppress the undeniable urge to gut Karen like a fish approximately ten minutes after she has gotten in my face. Never has it been more crucial for us to laugh at Karen, as laughter is the only thing that can defeat her sort of toxic femininity, and of course I don’t mean laughing as I see her flop in front of me, begging for mercy. I am saying we have to mock Karen even as she swallows the key to our prison cell. We have to meme her with a shard of charcoal on our last piece of paper though she has taken our computers away. We have to chortle, giggle, and pshaw at her and never give her the satisfaction of besting us, because unlike her, we will never sell our souls.
Miss Mask: YOU HAVE TO WEAR A MASK IN HERE!
Me: No, I don't.
Miss Mask: YES YOU DO! I don't have to serve you! You have to put on a mask!
Me: No, I do not. You are discriminating against me per the Americans with Disabilities Act. Should I go get the paperwork?
Miss Mask: I AM NOT SERVING YOU.
Me, in my best projected singing voice: NO SALE.
With that epithet, I about-faced and walked out of the store, never to return again.
I barely realized what had happened until I got to my car outside the store. That’s the problem with delayed-reaction syndrome. I had been on autopilot while in the store. It’s much like being in shock. I find being confronted extremely unpleasant, and my reality tends to go fuzzy and milky while it’s happening, like some kind of protective buffer, only to re-focus and crash afterwards.
My first emotion upon getting into my car was vitriolic anger. Dealing appropriately with my anger, I am convinced, is part of my karma in this lifetime. My anger isn’t normal and never has been normal. Maybe it is because it doesn’t set in right away until I realize what has happened; honestly I am not sure, but my anger is never proportionate to the situation. It is always excessive. To be honest, it would not bother me if a terrible fate befell Miss Mask. I won’t go into detail — you can read my novels for that — but I could easily watch as Miss Mask suffered without lifting a finger to help her. The main difference now is I don’t get busy wishing harm on her. The old me would have wished harm on her. The old me would have had more than the usual amount of success achieving the desired end: it’s easy to think harm in to being, or at least it is for me. Nowadays, I let the gods sort that out, and that does require a form of patience I didn’t used to possess.
As we near the holidays, we pass into a second year where many of us have acted as human firewalls of will standing between loved ones who want to endanger other loved ones with experimental MRNA injections. How many of us have lost good friends, spouses, and relatives to injection madness? I recently found out that a friend of a friend got her first injection while four weeks pregnant. This person had every opportunity to obtain real information about the dangers of the Covid injections. She will probably get another injection and a booster as per the “rules”. Knowing what we do about pregnant women and the shots, if she brings the child to term without any complications, it will be a genuine miracle. Another has withheld the company of a grandchild from his grandparents because they aren’t willing to jab and booster up. The grandchild has received at least two shots and will likely be getting boosters soon. Every day I hear of a new and sickening way of excluding normal people like myself from society. In Austria, the ones who refuse are prevented from working or shopping, just like Jews who didn’t have the right papers in 1943. In Australia, they are shunted off to internment camps. In Canada, they are being fired and forced onto the dole.
At every turn, the socially anxious are being turned out into the open arena of confrontation. We are in the Coliseum and it is trial by fire. I would like to be one of those people who just blows it off, who laughs at Karen and doesn’t make much of her bad intentions. Instead, I have to suppress the undeniable urge to gut Karen like a fish approximately ten minutes after she has gotten in my face. Never has it been more crucial for us to laugh at Karen, as laughter is the only thing that can defeat her sort of toxic femininity, and of course I don’t mean laughing as I see her flop in front of me, begging for mercy. I am saying we have to mock Karen even as she swallows the key to our prison cell. We have to meme her with a shard of charcoal on our last piece of paper though she has taken our computers away. We have to chortle, giggle, and pshaw at her and never give her the satisfaction of besting us, because unlike her, we will never sell our souls.
