Category Archives: Neighborhood

Easter for the Non-Religious

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It’s already Easter, March just flew by!  It seems I was just bitching about it only being February and BAM! Tomorrow’s the first day of April.  Easter weekend isn’t anything too special for my family, I haven’t been particularly religious since I was a kid.  Basically after the trauma of losing my Mother when I was in 5th grade, Christianity just morphed into “being a good person”.  Don’t get me wrong, I believe in God, I just don’t believe in organized religion or practicing my faith with in a church.  What it comes down to for my family and I is regardless of what you believe, try and be a good person.  I guess I’ll find out if that’s the wrong answer at the end of my life.  *Shrugs*

Easter as a kid was a big production for our family.  We’d all go (were dragged) to church in the morning after raiding our Easter baskets.  After church we’d head to my grandparents house for an Easter Egg hunt and dinner.  It was usually my grandparents, my parents, my sister and I, my Aunt and her daughter.  Definitely some fond memories there.

Like I already said, my family isn’t too religious.  I intend on teaching Nood about Christianity (and other religions once she gets a little older) so she can make the decision for herself.  So our house is pretty tame on Easter.  Of course we do Easter baskets and egg hunts, and most years we go to my parent’s house where they do an egg hunt for Nood.  This year we’re postponing it until next weekend.

One of the wonderful things about this Easter is that I had Good Friday off.  So hurrah for three day weekends!  Nood had a costume party at school on Friday, so I gave her the option of staying home with me or school, and she chose home.  So we hung out all day and relaxed.  Saturdays are always filled with errands here, so it was mostly shopping and cleaning, which we got a lot done.  Today though, today was extra nice.

Ry had to go help his sister move, so we did the Easter Baskets/Egg hunt first thing and then I dropped him off at the train.  Noodle and I came back and hung out for a couple of hours this morning and then cooked lunch together.  She helped make grilled cheese (with swiss on everything bread!!) and tomato soup.  Lunch together today was different.  There was no whining about food or any of that, she actually talked.  Like told me her “great ideas” and what she wanted to do this summer.  She’s a very vocal child as it is, meals are usually just punctuated with complaints since she’s the pickiest eater alive.  So it was definitely nice.

After lunch it was finally in the 50′s outside and the sun was shining.  We headed out in the backyard for a few hours, I got some writing in and Nood ran around like crazy alternating between the trampoline and swing set.  I think the sun did both of us some good.  Afterwards she helped me shell all of our coloured eggs and make Deviled Eggs.  I even got her to try one.  She tried so hard to eat it without making faces or complaining.  I had to laugh and let up on her.  Ha.

It was just really nice.  I’ve picked up Ry already, and Nood got some bike riding time in on her new bike with the neighbor boy so everyone’s pretty content.  I’ve sent Ry out to grill the skirt steaks I stuck in a marinade earlier, and for now it’s eerily quiet as the kid relaxes.

I was a little bummed about moving Easter Dinner at my parent’s to next weekend at first, but I ended up having a blast with my kid.  I wouldn’t trade today for anything.  Besides, next weekend is a double whammy.  My birthday (I’m growing down now) and Easter.  Fuck yes, I’m going to eat everything and drink too much wine.  :)

 

Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend too regardless of whether you celebrate or not.  Happy Spring!

Guns, Shootings and Suburbia.. OH MY!

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Let me pre-face this with a little bit of healthy ranting.  I hate suburban “gangbangers”, these kids need to realize that they are in the suburbs, not in the city.  If they think they are so BAD, I’ll give them a free ride down to the south side of Chicago and see how long they last.  Shut up, pull up your pants, give me your gun.  Gangs are stupid, shootings are stupid, you live in the suburbs!

It drives me insane.  Apparently there was a shooting in my neighborhood at one of the quick stop marts last night.  Of course all I can think of is “Damn, seriously? Someone needs to slap the shit out of those kids.” (FYI: I use the word kids not knowing how old the suspect was, and frankly I don’t care.  If you run around with a gun shooting people over stupid shit, you’re a kid.)  It just blows my mind.

I live in a “poor” town, especially in comparison with the next town over which is a tourist trap from hell.  Most of the residents here are good people, we haven’t really had a problem on our street except for some kids tagging a mailbox a few years ago (in which I offered them a ride to the south side too).  But of course, where there are “poor” people, there are stupid-fucking-kids who need an ass-whooping.  I do have to give it to the police here, they work the hardest they can to keep up with everyone, and I do see them patrolling quite often when there are issues.

It just blows my mind, it does.  What’s even worse is that there are parents in this neighborhood that encourage the gang-banger mentality.  Hey Mom and Dad, instead of letting your kids get drunk and high, how about making sure they get their butts to school?  Maybe punish them once in a while?  Stop letting your ghetto ass kids wander around the neighborhood at all hours, shouldn’t they be doing homework?  Sleeping?  Reading?  Chores?  Shit.  But nooooo, when your stupid ass kid gets busted stealing booze from Jewel Osco, you laugh and toss them outside.  How about not.

The sad fact of the matter?  I was looking for a news article online, trying to find out exactly what happened, and you wouldn’t believe the amount of shootings I found in the last 10 years!  Not in just my town either, all the way across the northern part of the county. (Granted they were sparse the farther I went back in time.)  Seriously?  What the fuck.  This is the type of shit that people move out of the city to get away from?  Of course it follows us out.

There is just no excuse.  You could come here and yelling for or against gun control and it wouldn’t get you anywhere.  These kids?  Didn’t register their guns (duh!), neither did their parents.  And no, people here aren’t going to arm themselves in enough numbers “to bring down crime” because one: they’re too poor, and two: it’s their shit-head kids who are stealing guns and shooting people.  Gun-control is null-and-void here.

What needs to happen is good-ole-discipline.  Parents need to rein in their little shit head kids, make them learn, punish them, trust me, a smack upside the head goes a long way.  Schools need to follow suit, if you feel the kid has a gun, have all those wonderful school cops frisk the fuck out of them and call the police.  Encourage learning and good grades, offer incentives, instead of “because you have to”.  More importantly,  residents of my town (hell, EVERY TOWN) need to stand up and so “This is IT, no more!!” and take care of each other.  On my street, we look out for each other… from the gang-bangers who walk around to that one creepy guy who was harassing my neighbors wife.  If you see something, be alert, call the police.  If you don’t stand up and stop it, no one will!  It’s not the bad-seeds that make a neighborhood, it’s the parents neglecting their children, it’s the residents hiding and pretending it’s not happening.

Some kids need an ass-whooping, some parents need a backbone, and everyone needs to stand together.  End of story.