Sarisleahsghost - She Herself Is A Haunted House

To head off any well-intentioned geopolitical questions:

I support and will fight for the safety, security, and civil rights of civilians always, and without regard for nationality. I reject the nation-state induced view that citizens of a polity are inherently guilty for the actions of said polity’s government/military by virtue of citizenship, race, ethnicity, or religion; and I reject the concept that people of a certain national or ethnic determination are inherently responsible for the actions of any government/military, including ones which purports to speak/exist for them.

what’s really bizarre, being from a mixed religious family background, is i recognize that i have the privilege of “passing,” for lack of a better word, of hiding and easily assimilating and blending. it’s not even that it’s a mask, because it’s something true. i grew up that way, it’s like code switching. sometimes it feels like impostor syndrome, but usually it's just all the facets of my person.

the man who drove us home today started talking about church. i could easily have engaged with that because, of course, we used to go to church with my grandparents on one side, and to the synagogue on the other. i’m versed in all the holidays, since throughout my childhood, we celebrated both. but as he was talking, perfectly nicely, this pit formed in my stomach - what if i voiced my identity? would that change the tenor of the conversation? (it would have, unavoidably, one way or the other.) would that put me, us, at risk? am i forced now to pretend to not be who i am? so i said nothing, and let my mom talk about my grandpa, and his devoted love of (and masters in) theology, and silently wondered if the man behind the wheel, talking about his faith, which i respect, would want to harm me if he knew who i was. this is not something i used to actively worry about, which perhaps was naïveté despite past experiences, blissful belief that it wasn’t “that bad.” it was safe enough. and now it’s a dark presence in my mind, a rustling anxiety. former “friends” on my dash would celebrate my murder if i had been born in the wrong (according to them) place, if they could get away with dehumanizing me with impunity as i have witnessed them doing to others undeserving of that treatment, with buzzwords and epithets. or maybe just for existing. and this isn’t paranoia or overreaction because i saw it with my own eyes. i saw it happen over and over, with people i used to regularly communicate with in frivolous little fandom conversations, which seem pointless to anything now. it is like living in a different world than the one that existed three weeks ago, one where the normal trajectory was abruptly thrown off course. and there’s nothing to be done about it, to fix it, to mitigate any of the hatred or any of the death, to offer succor to anyone affected or hurt or lost in all of this. there’s just the sorrow and the nagging buzz of fear. and it’s unknowable when that will abate. and how many more people will be harmed in the meantime. and if anyone will ever feel entirely safe amongst strangers again.

i always identified myself as a spiritual, but not religious person. both sides of my family were deeply faithful and i experienced and held reverence for that, cherished a lot of it, especially in ritual and holidays, but emerged on a less devout level, and that’s fine. ethnically i am jewish and always have said so. halves hardly matter, that is my heritage, it’s in my bones, it’s in the links of the chain to the past. i used to always observe shabbat (shabbos, how we say it) and lapsed, i lapsed in a lot of things when i became chronically ill and wasn’t directly involved with any sort of community anymore. it was just me being me, that was okay too. we put up our inter-holiday winter decorations, and it’s all traditions of memory and family and love, even as for many years those celebrations have only been my mom and me. it’s all there, inextricable from who i am.

i never learned hebrew properly but picked up all the prayers (which sadly i remember less now). i had an aliyah rather than a bat mitzvah (which we couldn’t afford anyway). i had to sing in front of the congregation and still remember the melody, my dad’s voice on tape teaching it to me. i still remember my grandma visiting and giving me the gold bracelet i loved directly off of her own arm for me to wear and to keep. i still remember the elderly man who came up to me after the service in tears and told me my voice was given from g-d and that he was so moved because i sang in the “soft” hebrew, words ending in “s” instead of “t,” and that was what his mother had always used from the old country, and he hadn’t heard it in so long (we always said the prayers this way, honestly i am not sure why, i guess it just carried over as ashkenazim, the way yiddish phrases did. it holds true with my hebrew name too, that version of sarah. my hebrew name, which is so familiar to me and part of me that i use it as email addresses and screen names and urls, that i would always tell people what it means because, growing up, i thought it was the greatest ever. princess leia as recognized in the book of life. that name probably being why i am attached to “s” urls here). i talked about this once, a long time ago (two blogs ago), but i've been told i look jewish, and told i don't look jewish, both in tones of derision and tones meant as compliment, you never quite know how that's going to be expressed. i treasured and held close to and was formatively influenced by and grew through countless pieces of jewish american art, jewish pop culture, characters, creators. the reverence in my heart for sondheim (or, like, name ANY 20th century broadway composer. i wish this was still online in full because it was beautiful), for the source of my url, for [insert name of artist here] is not idle, it is soul deep. i am not as engaged with the community or the religion as countless others, not nearly as directly tied or impacted, but the philosophy was always this - if they’d kill you for it, then you have the right to rejoice in and claim it too.

still. there’s a mezuzah on my bedroom door and a hamsa on my wall. they have flowers and birds and lavender and pink.

still. i say the shema in hebrew every day. just in case there’s a reason for it to be heard. just in case there’s a light there. it is the most sacred prayer, so it felt like something to keep close. (do you know how it starts? its opening line?)

i don’t think i consciously realized how deep that spiritual tie went until it was imbued with this much grief. it ceases to matter that maybe by percentages it’s only half of what i am. tell me where it’s written what it is i’m meant to be. perhaps i am no more than a blade of grass, but i am.

Jane Eyre Random House, 1943 Woodcut by Fritz Eichenberg

hi, jess!!!

I hope this blog becomes and stays a lovely little space for you to express yourself and your interests!! honored to be here with you for that journey!

here's some love to shower you (and the blog) in:

❤️🧡💛💚💙💜🤎🖤🤍♥️💘💝💖💗💓💞💕💌💟❣️❤️‍🩹❤️‍🔥❤️🧡💛💚💙💜🤎🖤🤍♥️💘💝💖💗💓💞💕💌💟❣️❤️‍🩹❤️‍🔥❤️🧡💛💚💙💜🤎🖤🤍♥️💘💝💖💗💓💞💕💌💟❣️❤️‍🩹❤️‍🔥❤️🧡💛💚💙💜🤎🖤🤍♥️💘💝💖💗💓💞💕💌💟❣️❤️‍🩹❤️‍🔥❤️🧡💛💚💙💜🤎🖤🤍♥️💘💝💖💗💓💞💕💌💟❣️❤️‍🩹❤️‍🔥💜❤️

(p.s. i am giving you a million hugs right now, you deserve everything nice in the world.)

hi my lovely!!! thank you so much, you are always such a warm presence and i'm very happy to have you here with me.

*hugs tight* twirling in all your confetti hearts! this made me really happy 🥰💗💖💞💕💝💕💞💖💗

#this post is honestly baffling to me as a non-jew who's been screaming in every leftist space available to me#y'all are out here trying to give praise i genuinely. fuck. not to be dramatic but i dont know a single leftist worthy of that right now?#bc ive been sitting here thinking about this nonstop for days#how are we supposed to just#a c c e p t that a majority of western/EU leftists just.... cheered for a terrorist organization for a week and counting#a literal nazi organization#that the people of PALESTINE protest against#like a majority of leftists just. stood up and screamed and cheered and blocked out the voices of the people actually involved#and i read posts during the first wave of that bullshit from jewish ppl that were like#'when this is over we will set it aside and we will continue to coexist with you (how can we not? what choice do we have?)'#'but know that the trust is gone'#and im still in genuine fucking awe because y'all were literally in the MIDDLE OF IT and STILL managing to be more level headed and i just#i want to take the hand of every single jewish person who interacted w this post and be like#'nope. we havent earned that.' bc we havent!!!!!!!#on a FUNDAMENTAL level if we as leftists cant even make this space safe enough for our own members to point out violent antisemitism#AND OPPRESSION!!! then we absolutely have not earned a back pat#if so fucking many of us fell into that trap of racist radicalism then we have failed REPEATEDLY for too long#it means we havent fully removed that bigotry from our foundations. it means we arent teaching enough critical thinking within our little#interconnected echo chambers. the deep rooted/intergenerational demons reared their heads on this one#if anything the jewish people interacting w this post should save that praise for when/IFFFF we finally get that fucking straightened out#anyway shoutout to y'all. i literally cannot imagine the strength it took to get through this week. the weight would crush me. (via @commanderquinn)

To all the non-Jews who are actually standing up and speaking out against this terror and able to recognize the harm done to the Jewish people: Thank you. We will not soon forget who stood with us.

(x)

…friend shaped

once i accidentally stepped on angel’s tail and she yelped, and it was the worst sound i could have heard. once, near the end of her life, when she wasn’t wanting to eat, i dropped her bowl and screamed/cried in anguish and scared her. neither of these were intended, and yet still haunt me and feel unforgivable, even though she did not have the capacity to hold it against me and did forgive me immediately. i still don’t forgive myself for the circumstances of her last few days spent mostly alone in the hospital, because they refused to release her to us and let her be at home. rationally this is not my fault, but it feels like a failing that can never be remedied, like so many other things i have failed at, no matter how far out of my control.

all this to say. i just don’t understand how people, with cruel purpose and malice, intentionally inflict violence and harm and mayhem and irrevocable trauma on living beings of any kind (human or animal), i don’t understand how you can get so far into the darkness that you switch off the cutting sense of hurt and horror i felt just hearing that squeak from my precious dog’s tail getting pinched for a split second. i don’t understand how history and the present day are littered with utter disregard of, or derivement of pleasure in, inflicting damage and pain. i don’t understand how you can hear a cry and not feel like you’re going to bleed to death from it. i don’t understand how the grief isn’t so overwhelming that no one would ever do any of that to begin with. i don’t understand why the world has ever been the way that it is. i understand it less the longer i have to live in it.