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All that hassle getting Rosa to sleep, and now I can't sleep. I wish the thunderstorm would hurry up and get here. There's a bit of lightning in the distance, but it's so far off I can't even hear the thunder, and no rain yet.

The morning news

The second priest suspended from Ray's parish church Our Lady of Sorrows, Rev Gary Wolken, was arrested and charged with eight counts of child molestation.

This is the same man who was Ray's "spiritual director" and counseled him on our marital troubles. He told Ray on his first visit that Ray was "a better man than most" for not having divorced me already. At that point, all I had done was admit to being in love with Kirk and cry about it a lot. I also said I didn't want to give up a strong and deep friendship that I had had for eight years. He felt that I ought to sacrifice anything for him.

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I have a lot of things written down on a piece of paper to remind me to post about them, and I'm not in the mood to write about individually or at length.. So here's a jumble.

• News item that the US is implementing an alien registration system, complete with photographs and fingerprints, and periodic checkins. Reminded me of my days in Japan: having to be fingerprinted just because one is not a citizen was very humiliating. It felt like the minute any crime occurred, they were going to use the alien registration list fingerprints first before looking for citizens as suspects.
  
  There's a rant hiding here, one I've made many times, about the acquiescence of the citizenry in the erosion of our civil rights and liberties. It's not our job to give the police more handles on us. Where is the line? Where does it end? Pastor Niemuller's quote seems apropos again...So Arabs (and those who appear Arab to ignorant observers) and Muslims (not synonymous!) are being singled out now. What group is next? Pagans? Queers? Uppity women?


• I had more weird dreams last night. Maybe I'll write about them later.


• Middle-of-the-night revelation du jour (or de la nuit): Not only do I deserve to be fucking cherished (thanks, WomBAT), but I also deserve to have and express my feelings. I shouldn't have to keep things back out of fear of someone's reacting badly. I'm not responsible for reactions. Sure, that doesn't mean actively trying to hurt people, but I shouldn't have to pretend to be happy when I'm not, or vice versa for that matter. I'm not expressing this well. I'll have to try again when my brain is working.


• I've never seen anyone play two saxophones at once before!
  
  I went to Jazz in June at the Missouri Botanical Garden tonight. Rebecca didn't make it, but I hung out with MJ and her husband and friend anyway. It was very nice, good music, cool evening (and not a drop of rain! I even saw the evening star!), food, wine, conversation.