Bigger or Better: Life outside of Texas

 'Tis the season for allergies. Normally, the spring/summer allergy season gives me a bit of sneezing and some itchy eyes. Nothing that a daily Claritin can't handle. When it finally starting warming up in April, I started daily Claritin and Flonase and trusted I'd be fine. I think you can figure out that it is not fine. One fine day in late April, I decided to go on a run to the grocery store [I mean literally a run; getting food motivates me to exercise]. I wore a mask and sunglasses, and these in theory should have prevented my body encountering many allergens. So I was caught off-guard when I started sneezing heavily in the grocery store. To put it vaguely, my mask became the nose-equivalent of a diaper. I had my husband pick me up. the test It took several days of heavy doses of Benadryl to finally control the sneezing. The misery was enough for me to find an allergist, consent to be pricked with 60 different allergens, and then start a 5-year regimen of allergy shots,...

Communicating is hard. I just want to start this post by saying that premise, because I am so nervous that I won't present my thoughts accurately.  Yesterday I read a news article about a "mormon sex therapist" [aka a therapist who is a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, who counsels on topics relating to sex, but doesn't have any special authority from the church] who was excommunicated for advocating against Church stigma associated with pornography, masturbation, same-sex marriage, maybe other stuff. This is a tricky topic; some may think I should stay out of this mine-strewn controversy. But I think this is important, even social-life/death important. From my understanding of the event, I see two primary issues: the differences between society and religion, and religious rights. Parts of society have become more accepting of porn use, masturbation, same-sex marriage, to name a few. Most of those I consider to be in the I-don't-understa...