Life According to Steph: Thursday Thoughts - What is it that they're really looking for just a hobby on the internet

1. Mom and Rich were here Monday to last night. It was a nice and relaxed visit. We walked the boards Monday night and saw a lovely sunset. Tuesday after work I hit the beach with them and Mom bought pizza for dinner, and Wednesday we did sunrise and shelling at Corson's Inlet, Mom and I went to the Farmers Market, and we strolled Asbury at lunch. Plus dog walks and general lolling around.

2. That's right, sunrises are back. No regrets avoiding the wake up before 4:45a, hazy, buggy, crowded summer sunrises in favor of the wake up around 6:20, quiet, my dogs can come fall ones. Best friend dogs are back on the beach seven days earlier than technically permissible. We all break rules (even those law and order people), this is one of my big ones.

3. This is that Monday night sunset. The waves were big and the currents very strong most of the week from storms churning up. The light has been beautiful at night.

4. Fall light is wonderful, and it became official on Tuesday.

5. I saw this on Instagram and bought it. Is it perfect or is it fucking perfect?

6. I am off Friday and Monday and I frankly cannot wait.

7. Nails of the week - Essie without reservations - this has some sparkle to it which you can't see well in this photo. Solid fall color. Or any time of year color because we do what we want when we want.

8. Breonna Taylor was never getting justice under this system which was designed to work to be unjust for Black and brown people. The entire system is guilty. It needs to be abolished and we have to start fresh and build one that is just for ALL people. As Audrey Lord said, the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house." Kentucky has a democrat governor, Louisville has a democrat mayor, the Attorney General is Black and the police chief is Black. NO CHARGES FOR THE POLICE THAT KILLED BREONNA TAYLOR because the goddamn system is working as it was designed to. There is no justice in this systemically racist system even IF people working in it say and believe Black Lives Matter. Even IF people working in it are themselves Black. Charging a police officer for wanton endangerment for his bullets going through walls and possibly killing someone versus not charging him for his bullets going through someone's damn body and actually killing them. How can you not see this? How can there be justice when shooting the walls of a white person's apartment brings charges and killing a Black person with the same bullets during the same incident does not? Legally allowable does NOT equal justice and we all fucking know it. Slavery was legally allowable. How can there be justice when regular people focus on property damage around protests instead of people protesting EN MASSE all over the country over the lived experience of Black people in America? Hell they're protesting on behalf of Black Americans in other countries too. Property over people is a fucked up place to live, and that's why I freak out when people focus on property damage surrounding any protest against racial injustice - it all connects. See where it connects here? What exactly do we mean when we say Make America Great Again? To return to our lips not coming near the same water fountains, our asses not sitting on the same seats, our kids not going to the same schools, our neighborhoods staying lily white, red lining, Jim Crow, Black bodies being used and discarded, Black labor being valued differently? Was America great in those times? What time do we want to go back to when America was great? The entire time we've been racist since the beginning? The incredible horror we've inflicted on the native people and the land? The time when we fought World War II against fascism? Wait, people are against Antifa now, which essentially means being in support of fascism, so that can't be right. It seems like we want to go back to women dying from back alley abortions too. Is that the time? All of the above times? I don't have enough expletives right now. And to quote something I saw on the Internet last night, fuck off I'm not leaving just because it's unjust and fucked up here. There is work to be done. We cannot change the past but we sure as FUCK should not be going back to any time in it because America was NEVER great for ALL of her people. Act right and stop saying Make America Great Again. Your racism is showing. Work to build a better tomorrow for EVERYONE instead. No fucking exceptions. To see how many white people are invested in upholding this system that disproportionately benefits them, read any comment section on the Internet. The longer we hold on to old ways designed to keep a foot on the neck of Black people (read a book, the criminal justice system was literally designed to do this, and modern day police themselves were born from slave catchers-we need to start ENTIRELY OVER), the more the unrest grows and makes everyone less safe. Change is needed for the well being of Black people, brown people, white people, and police of every color.