I enjoyed Moulin Rouge very much last night -- the cast, orchestra, and ensemble were fantastic. Particularly the ensemble. As a former dancer, I have a lot of opinions about the ensemble generally, but this ensemble was fantastic! All the dancers hit their marks, the choreography was superb, and every single member had great extension and turn out. It was very much a visual spectacular and the dancers were fantastic!! They did a good job with their renditions of the pop songs as the musical numbers, but it seemed a pity they didn't use much from the film other than the names. The book was poorly written, but I expected that. But visually it was stunning and the ensemble were incredible. As was the actor who played Christian (whose name happened to also be Christian) -- he was one of the best vocalists I've heard in a long while on a touring production!!!!
My sunburn is more healed than Crissy's when she came over for cocktails on Tues and again for dinner/musical theatre on Weds (even though my initial burn was worse) BUT I heal fast and intentionally went stood in the pouring rain to cool it the evening I first got it AND then continuously put aloe on it to cool/soothe/heal/keep moisturized AND then slept 15 hours Sun into Monday and another 12 hours Mon into Tuesday and my body shuts me down into sleep mode when it needs to heal. Crissy didn't put anything on her burn and wasn't sleeping enough due to work and family stressors. Mine is still painful to the touch and radiating heat but as of yesterday the itching started and it's abominable and I want to scratch my back horribly but the pain is still too raw to touch it. It's a very annoying stage of sunburn tbh.... From past sunburns, the itching is only going to get worse and the peeling will start before the weekend, lol.
Today I need to try to make phone calls back to insurance people to get quotes (seriously only progressive actually lets you build it in the site for quick compare, the others require a lot of phone calls -- it's making me tempted to choose Progressive because it's less hassle) and I'm very tired of my inbox, texts, and phone blowing up from different insurance companies wanting to selle policies without actually getting me the policy to look at before I agree.
I only have the morning today to make calls though because I need to be back downtown at county clerk's office by 1:30 for in person special voting deputy training. The Spring was pretty casual, but already for the fall partisan primary (which has two important referendum on it) they're ramping up training on harassment and de escalation and when to call police if election workers are threatened. Also, my shift in August for the proper election day for fall partisan primary (which is the Tuesday between La Crosse and Milwaukee Irish fest) is 6am til close (meaning checking all ballots over for write ins after doing all the absentee and fwad ballot and packing everything up) and I'm preemptively exhausted with that timing. It also means I need to vote absentee or early to make that shift work.
Also. I unfollowed Eric on insta this morning. Earlier this week either Mon or Tues, but I saw it on Tues, he had like four stories and his last story of the day claimed "this story is unavailable for you" meaning he has shared something from Britt, Liz, or the band (all of whom blocked me back in 2018 for me stating that I loved the new song but most of the country music between sets and as openers at shows was painful enough to my synesthesia that as long as that was part of the experience I wouldn't be able to attend future shows to hear them live AND ever since being blocked for that honesty they have been defensively unwilling to discuss or make right that choice they made.) Then he kept showing up at the top of my feed with a story to watch but any time I clicked on it got the black screen with white text "this story is unavailable to you" message. Which annoyed me greatly and made me push him away internally and sit in the internal mental place of, "your sister wishes not to exist to me -- that means that to respect her chosen and enforced boundary, when you work with her or share things from her, you no longer exist to me. It's your sister's boundary she created, take it up with her if you don't like it." (It very negatively impacted my formerly good opinion of his sister and since she has taken no actions except defensiveness and ghosting in the last six years to choose differently, she has only continued her behaviors as someone who engaged in mean girl bullying behaviors of us vs them injustice. It has colored for me all her talk about standing up against injustice by engaging in dialogue look like hypocrisy if she was going to engage in identical behaviors of ostracism and refusing to acknowledge her us vs them acts of injustice created by herself when she is given even the small amount of power of having admin rights on a band's social media account. You don't have solid ethics or ideals if you sell them out engage in what you deride others for doing the moment you have the opportunity to exercise any power over others. You're just another white hypocrite claiming you believe in something for social cred but never walking the walk or talking the talk to act upon those ideals in your real life choices.) More than the content itself, it's the bitterness of being reminded of the ongoing injustice of how she chose to handle it and him perpetuating the bullying of his sister's choices/actions that is the problem. It could have been the most adorable picture possible that he shared, but because it came up with the bullying via ostracism injustice of "this content is unavailable to you" so I never even saw the content just the automated you can't sit with us message all it did was sow seeds of bitterness over the arbitrary unfairness, injustice, and bullying of his sister's behavior patterns in 2018 and the choices/actions to continue defensively ghosting standing behind the past choices rather than at least acknowledging it or doing something to make things right. It's also why I set this to private then took a few days break from social media and writing my feelings/thoughts out here to keep me from working myself up into a mood where I would react from the bitterness of Brittany's past/ongoing choices and the consequences of them other people must pay for rather than balanced consideration of what I wanted. Then this morning (I didn't check my social media after getting home, just got ready for bed and read a little before sleeping early because tired) there was another story from him with the same message and I couldn't clear it out of my stories -- and since I didn't want the bitterness all day over having that reminder of the unfairness of how the girls treated me and have dealt with that in the band's name as a collective, I just decided to unfollow Eric and to impose on myself the same thing I had told him down the bond, "Your sister has chosen to not want to exist to me and to insist on that boundary for herself and in the name of the entire band as a collective. This means that ANYTHING you create or do that involves her and/or the band does not exist to me either, by her choices and actions. It means that while you're working with her creatively, you can't exist to me to comply with the boundary she created and keeps in place."
And yes, this means that as a lifelong theatre loving witch, so the main audience primed to love and buy everything related to the musical, I have absolutely zero interest and intend to never see their southern gothic musical about a witch trial that finds a real witch BECAUSE it involves Britt and Brittany's choices and actions for herself and on the band's Instagram account. Because she chose to be a bitch to me and even if it was a bad day she made that choice, she got defensive doubled down every time I tried to bring it up and clear the air heal things. So as far as I am concerned, there is nothing that involves Britt or Liz or the band as a whole that exists for me to respect the boundary of their creation and their enforcement, and there is no healing or fixing it for Brittany or anything involving her to exist to me unless/until she chooses to own up to it and heal what she broke.
For me, it's very simple and straightforward and there's no shifting it without addressing and healing the root cause of the problem that she wishes not to exist to me. That's he boundary, her business, and I will respect it as her boundary even if I do not understand it and I will do my best to ensure that she does not exist to me. But there are consequences. Anything, and I do mean ANYTHING he creates or does that involves his sister or Liz ceases immediately to be of interest to me or even exist to me because they don't wish to exist to me. Solo album? Delighted excitement for the promise of new music from you!!! Involving either of the girls or the band in the recordings? I guess those songs aren't for me then, I hope other people will love what you recorded.... Solo shows? Brilliant -- love your songwriting, tour performances everything about it!! Liz or Britt guesting in the solo show -- show doesn't exist to me because they don't wish to exist to me and so I feel nothing now about your solo shows. Writing and staging a musical about trying to burn a real witch? Absolutely fantastic and I'm so impatiently excited to hear it -- I love musical theatre, I love witches and all things witchy, I love a good heroine/villainess redemption/revenge arc!!! Your sister helped write the songs and is part of the staging process of said witchy musical? The musical no longer exists to me no matter how it turns out or who else you get involved in the process and performance because one of the central creators wishes not to exist to me, so this is of no interest to me.
Be careful what you ask for because you will receive precisely that and all the consequences. Because of the choices and boundaries created and maintained by Brittany and Liz for themselves personally and in the name of the band as a collective, there is nothing you can do or create that involves them that will be of interest to me or even exist to me for as long as they maintain their boundary of not wishing to exist to me. It's quite literally that straightforward, and only their personal free will choices to choose healing instead of ostracism can alter those consequences. Ever in this life.
The moment you involve either of them, for as long as they desire not to exist to me, it becomes a non starter and is of no interest to me because I will treat it as not existing to me per their choices and boundaries of their creation and maintenance. Not my own feelings about you or the project nor the content nor the quality no how much everything about it should be something I love will matter in this situation -- the ONLY thing that will count is that you are working with someone whose personally chosen boundary is to wish not to exist to me and I will respect that boundary even if I dislike it and don't understand it. Boundaries are the sole property of the person who made it and their feelings, not about whether the person they applied it to or any of the consequences of that boundary affect or hurt other people.
I don't like it so I don't ask you to like it, but I do ask you to understand that boundaries are 100% about the person who created them and their triggers and what they like so neither your dislike nor mine matter in this case since the boundaries are not of our making. But I need you to understand that everything you create with Brittany or Liz and every time you share something originating from one of those three accounts that the girls decided to block me on in 2018, you do NOT make me desire to know what the content is or to want a relationship with the girls or the band as a collective. What you do is to remind me which side of the boundary created by their ostracism you are on and that one of the consequences of the girls choosing ostracism for themselves and the band as a collective is that I need to accept letting you go because what you are involved in doesn't exist to me due to the girls' boundaries they created and maintain. All Eric told me by sharing those posts is he made his free will choice which side of the ostracism boundary his sister created he is on and I need to make me accept that and have nothing to do with him. Whatever his intention, that is the only way I can understand it when all I can see of the story is the black screen with white lettering "This content is unavailable to you" and the reminder of EXACTLY what that means and that he was sharing something from one of those three sources. As far as I'm concerned, that was all he did by sharing those stories, whatever they were, and I accept his choices and his truth and the consequences thereof so I will let him go not be in my life so he can build his life with those who have chosen not to exist to me. If you don't like the consequences or if they want to exist to me to be involved in things that exist to me I can care about, take up with Brittany and Liz their blocking me ostracizing me on the band account and their personal accounts and telling them to reassess their choices and boundaries to fix it. Because neither you nor I can do that for them, this mess is 100% of their making and their continuing. Until then, it's their chosen boundaries so nothing they do or create or become involved in exists to me in order for me to be able to respect that boundary of THEIR creation and maintenance. That straightforward and that immovable without their choosing to move it.
And that includes Eric since he's working with her again this week and sharing things from her and/or the band account again. And I ain't got time or energy emotional capacity right now to play the bullying mind games created by other people's choices -- if you want to play stupid games to win stupid prizes. Fine, go for it -- but count me out. I want nothing to do with anyone who will condone or take part in that sort of behavior. It's not adding anything positive to my life by allowing that in to destabilize me. And I'm sorry if Eric feels as caught in the middle "I didn't choose this" as I do about it, but also you're choosing to condone her bullying behaviors and allow them to continue and take part in it by sharing things from the collective you are a part of in whose name she's behaving this way as well as in her own name. That's you and your sets of choices -- you may not have chosen to create the situation of injustice, but you're choosing to let it perpetuate in your name as part of a collective and to be an active member of that collective share things from it as an implicit statement you endorse what is done in its name and aren't trying to fix what has been broken. Those are your choices. So I feel no guilt about you having to pay for your part in the choices to perpetuate bullying in the name of the collective you are actively a member of participating in and sharing things from.
I can't make any promises for future me choices, but I'm ready to accept "rejection is protection" spiritual growth place towards Eric and let him go from my life path this lifetime -- even if the rejection is coming from his sister's bullying behaviors from the past which she refuses to acknowledge or change, he's still complicit in taking part perpetuating them and passing them along and allowing them to exist in his name as a member of the band. I cannot wish him ill, but as long as he's working creatively with his sister sharing anything from her or the band account she blocked me on in 2018, then to respect the boundary of his sister's creation and maintenance, Eric does not exist to me while he's working with her. For me it's that straightforward and there's no way for him to improve the situation while those blocks from the band account and her personal account exist by her choice. As I see it, the choices are to choose to work on healing this or to choose to accept let it go. Now, I would PREFER healing it but that's not something I can do all by myself without any cooperation/communication with the others involved. Trying to square the circle of having Eric in my life at all while keeping the toxic patterns of bullying ostracism boundaries created by his sister's choices and actions since 2018 without healing the consequences to find a balance that is workable for EVERYONE'S emotional/mental/spiritual well being is NOT a tenable way forward because the ostracism is still a player in the patterns of interactions. It's a toxic pattern that recurs if we don't break free of it and it will always be toxic and the only choices I see that are not inherently toxic patterns for me and him are to choose healing of the toxic dynamic her choices created/maintain or to choose letting go of the potentiality of anything growing between me and Eric. There may be other ways that aren't toxic patterns, but frankly I don't see them and none of them have worked because how can they so long as she is integral to his life as he has built it but wishes to not exist to me? She has created a binary "choose me or her" situation and I can't find a way out of that toxic pattern into a compromise via the actions available to me without cooperation/communication with others who would also prefer healing and rapprochement.
P.S. This morning when I checked it, my sunburn was still radiating enough heat that the coldest possible summer water (as cold as the outdoor pipes to get it to the building allow) was still uncomfortably hot against the skin that it hit after the sunburn, BUT it did not heat the cold water so hot to be scalding on the rest of the skin so I could FINALLY shower which I haven't been able to do since before Saturday. Which was also good because today was the in person SVD training and I did want to be showered before that.
[Post Title: lyrics to the Caamp song The Otter. I love this song so ridiculously much. It just makes me happy every time I hear it, both when I put it on and when it comes on the radio.]
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