US isn't 'safe for tourists' and calls to cancel the Olympics

[slightlv]

49. OldBaldy, I empathize.

I'm Pagan, ask me if I feel safe to practice my religion as the Xtians in this country practice theirs, especially in this region. Last year, I lost my best friend, a gay male who had stood with me as a divine couple during our worship. Our group is based more on energies than outward appearances, and so we often stood at the altar in a "mixed up" union as some who visited us declared. But I've always had more of what we considered male attributes... quick decisions to issues and problems, overt assertiveness, not exactly maternal in nature (unless it was to our critter friends)... Jim, OTOH, was the gentlest of souls I'd ever met; nurturing, balancing, and gods, how I miss him in my life.

Between my spiritual path and the fact I'm a woman... and don't exactly exude that "feminism" of submissiveness so deemed to be our overriding trait, I'm trying to stay in the background as much as possible now. But things are coming to a head, both out there in the world and within me. Something has to break. We're building to a peak of action; I just don't know what form that action will take. That silly little optimist that still holds a piece of my heart, tells me it'll be people finally making the magas and the other haters to descend back into the holes they once hid within. That good can overcome evil. But then, there are those other days.... (sigh)