There are some books you feel like you could have written yourself (under different circumstances and with talent and skill) and Thrall by Rebecca Mahoney is one of them...oh my gosh: it is so good and surprisingly creepy!

My favorite passages so far:

My mother always said I’d get eaten alive, out here in the world. Of course, every time she said it, “the world” meant a different thing. The bus stop. The crosswalk. College, eventually. When I was little, I always thought reassuring her was just a matter of proving that I was  capable of navigating the wicked snares of the grocery store parking lot. But what my mother was holding on to was deeper, like it so often is. What she was afraid of was never bus stops, or crosswalks, or campuses. To her, they were all the same: a lottery wheel, always turning. And every time she or I left the house, it turned again and again.

I was never afraid of the wheel. Maybe it was the fact that she’d raised me in a layer of Bubble Wrap, but I’ve always found it romantic that there’s no real life without chance. And if all the terrible things waiting for me—in the grocery store, at the crosswalk, or here, on our campus—if all of them came down to bad luck, then that was more comforting than scary. There’s no real malice in that. Whatever could happen to me, it would never be personal. 

I tried to tell her that, once. But that was never how she saw it. To her, the wheel had intention. It had teeth.

And:

Lucy was miles away from anyone who would know this about her, but there was nothing that could stun her into compliance quite like a beautiful girl wielding a certain, effortless competence. She had, rather famously, fallen for her ex after listening to her order a sandwich.

I can't wait to watch more of Prime's original Ride or Die when I get home tonight. I'm halfway through and adore this show so much, so far. The friendship chemistry is melting my heart and the humor is easing some of my anxiety and the wild parts have sparked my interest. 

I don’t know if I can explain this without sounding odd, but I recently presented a class celebrating Marilyn Monroe’s 100th birthday and after I finished all the research and after the class was over, even though I think the class went pretty well I just felt so despondent over her life and how she’s misinterpreted by different biographers, depending on who’s writing about her…

 Like Norman Mailer’s work on her is just dreadful…not all male biographers of course but a good amount of them tend to treat her as an object or possession instead of a human being. I called my class Marilyn Monroe at 100: icon, intellectual and influencer, but later I worried that I saw things that aren’t there. 

I believe firmly that she loved to read and was much smarter than she came across and yet some biographies treat her with such a one track mind. 

A couple hours after my class was over I discovered a book that I never saw when I was doing my research. It’s called The Many Lives of Marilyn Monroe by Sarah Churchwell. I feel like she might be addressing this in her book:

The Many Lives of Marilyn Monroe

Monroe

Sarah Churchwell

Kindle Highlights 

It is not just the case that biographies of Marilyn Monroe disagree about the answers to charged questions about her life, her character and her experiences. They often do not acknowledge that other versions even exist.

(Location 69)

Marilyn has gone from sex symbol to a symbol of mourning, from a promise of the liberation of sex to a cautionary tale about the dangers of loneliness and spinsterhood.

(Location 90)

Churchwell dedicates a large portion of it to tearing apart biographers like Norman Mailer, arguing that they projected their own fantasies onto her rather than treating her as a thinking human being. She calls out how Mailer, in particular, mythologized her to fit his own narrative of American masculinity and victimhood.

Reading about how she was distorted can feel almost as violating as reading about the distortion itself. It's a heavy read because it forces you to confront just how cruel the industry and the media were to her intelligence. 

She spent her whole life trying to show people that side of her, and she was often laughed at for it. 

I still have more to say...

The Bewitching by Silvia Moreno-Garcia is one of those books I would hug to my heart if I still read print copies, but I feel no less strongly about it just because it's through my Kindle.It's one of those titles that hits hard because even if it doesn't exactly reflect your life experiences it echoes them enough to hurt pretty, pretty hard.

This passage, for instance:

Such generosity, such thoughtfulness. Carolyn was my friend. 

Yet I loved Ginny. 

At the time I was unable to recognize the nature of my feelings. I’d had schoolgirl crushes on other young women, yet I was struck quickly and suddenly with what amounted to true love when it came to Ginny. I loved the sound of her voice, the curve of her mouth, her long monologues at night while she brushed her hair and she told me about a book she’d read or a painting she’d seen. This might be why she has lingered in my thoughts for so long: because she was my first love. It was a one-sided, silent love, and yet it was true. 

This might also be why I sometimes feel I understand Edgar’s grief better than Carolyn ever did. Both of us were left brokenhearted and bereft.

And there is another passage that is so eerily similar it feels like sharing the passage would be almost the same as sharing something way too private about myself or the person it reminds me of so much. I've been experiencing a lot of emotional things this month so this read is packing an extra wallop of feelings and mental time travel.

(later):

Oh my gosh!...I've gotten much further into The Bewitching and I feel strongly that I should list a trigger warning about incest (in a different subplot than the above)...to me this is no longer the beautiful, special book I started out reading. I've got stop getting excited about books until I've actually finished them.

(later later):

I ended up with very mixed feelings about this book, but I still really treasure those earlier passages, mentioned above.

 

It has hit me surprisingly hard how much I already miss the show The Way Home..the last time I was saddened by a program ending before its time was when Fringe left the air in 2013. (Actually I still haven't quite gotten over Fringe being canceled). 

Ever since I read Hanging Out With Cici by Francine Pascal in middle school I've thought how neat and even helpful it would be for someone to be able to go back in time and meet their mom when she was younger. Very few women I know don't have complicated relationships with their mother, no matter how much love may be there. 

Besides my being a huge scifi-time travel geek, that complication is a huge part of why I adored The Way Home so much...and was thrilled that my mom watched it with me, in another state, with us calling each other during commercials.

 

as seen on ebay

I've loved Marilyn Monroe films for as long as I can remember and the more I read about her the more I like what I read:

“Marilyn loved animals; she was drawn to all living things. She would spend hundreds of dollars to try to save a storm damaged tree, and would mourn its death. She welcome birds, providing treehouses in food for the many species that lived in her lawn; she worried about them and bad weather. She was worried about dogs and cats. She once had a dog that was by nature contemplative, but she was convinced he was depressed. She did her best to make him play, and that depressed him even more; on the rare occasions when he did an antic pirouette, Marilyn would kiss him and hug him, delirious with joy”- Norman Rosten (poet and friend of Marilyn)

What on earth does it mean when your comfort show used to be Golden Girls and now it's Dexter? Does it mean there's something wrong with me that I'm on my fourth re-watch of Dexter in five years and I'm just as captivated and invested as ever.

But it's not the dark moments that haunt me as much as ones like this scene, where Dexter struggles with understanding human connections:

 I can't say enough good things about Grant Ginder's So Old, So Young, but I will try next time I post...

She began to think about her own life, about how little she had seen or accomplished, and suddenly felt incredibly young, like she had been thrust into something without being properly prepared for it, even though she had ostensibly received the same preparations as everyone else. She felt as though when she looked around her everyone else’s life was starting up, while she was sitting at her desk, writing about men’s colognes, waiting for something to happen.

This^^^ and so many other passages hit hard:

But whenever Marco looked at her she felt a hot, suffocating embarrassment. She thought about the night of Alison Liu’s birthday, where she had gotten too drunk, too hopeful that her mistakes could so easily be corrected with a single late-night confession. The sides of her face burned and she scrubbed harder. She wanted to disappear. 

Two days after Alison’s party, Marco had called her—she remembered how she was walking home from the subway when she saw his name on her screen. She thought about answering it, but then the call rolled over to voicemail and she immediately deleted his number from her phone, along with the message he had left her. She wanted to pretend that night had never happened—she convinced herself that, if she obliterated all signs of it, she could. 

She listened to songs about being strong and independent, and she stopped smoking so many cigarettes, and she spent time with people she loved, and she bought self-help books with images of inspiring mountains on their covers. She was an infrequent user of social media, but now she began posting pictures of herself having fun, and paired them with thoughtful, cryptic captions. A shot of her on the Brooklyn Bridge, and under it a lyric from the Cranberries. A picture of her smiling in Sheep Meadow, with a line from Rilke. None of it worked—instead she felt as if she was going through the breakup a second time, though in this case it was Marco who was breaking up with her. She saw that her choice hadn’t been deliberate and well-thought-out, but rather a failure of imagination—she had been so focused on keeping her life exactly as it was, without realizing that so much of that life was Marco. 

To that end, she hadn’t really made a choice at all so much as she had stood back and allowed inertia to handle things for her. She stopped buying herself luxury bath bombs and listening to Taylor Swift—she began to think that buying luxury bath bombs and listening to Taylor Swift were signs that you were a sucker who was depressed.

And:

Nina smiled, even though she felt like she was going to cry. She and Carol both knew that there were no friends she could invite over, because if there were, Nina wouldn’t have FaceTimed Carol in the first place. 

She couldn’t understand what made her so repellent. She considered herself to be reasonably smart, she was very good at her job, and now that she had money she always put effort into wearing cute outfits. But when she was around people in social settings, she lost all sight of those things and felt instead a sort of crippling anxiety, this insufferable need to impress and be liked by them that she couldn’t seem to quash. She heard herself say ridiculous things, and immediately afterward would see herself through everyone else’s eyes. She was a try-hard and a loser—the sort of person that people talked about as soon as she left the room, and whose jokes always killed the momentum of a group text. Things weren’t supposed to be this way. She was supposed to be like her mother, someone whose life was overloaded with love and who felt burdened by too many dinner invitations. She was supposed to have someone to confide in, and instead she was thirty-five and alone.

It's been a while since I read a book where so much of it resonates with me, even if there are characters within in that are not always likable. Ironically, Nina seems to be the least liked by her friends, but she is the character I relate to the most, even though she appears it in relatively little compared to the rest of the characters. How she comes across is so completely separate from who she actually is that my heart hurts for with understanding and something I can't completely define.

d…

Maybe, sometimes, you think you are over a thing or a person or an event and then you realize that it's possible that it's more like whatever or whoever was bothering you didn't go away, but, instead, is lying dormant within you.

This occurred to me the other day when a friend told me that someone we both know, but haven't seen in a while, invited a bunch of common acquaintances to an event she is performing at in a few weeks. My friend knows how I used to feel about this person, but perhaps she forgot or just didn't think or figured I'm over her, when she informed me that all of them are going. 

The sting of tears and the hurt I felt at not being included shocked me, even though it's for the best I don't go anyway. Truly, I thought I had put all of my ridiculous, over-the-top feelings behind me. I still think I have. But I can't deny that I also have become very good at pushing emotions down, like so far down they appear and feel non-existent.

For the first time in years I no longer find myself mad at the world (or, more specifically, the people within the world who are turning it into a shitake mushroom show)...I just feel rather numb, with occasional tears, but not many. 

I haven't cried when I shouldn't (i.e. at work) in a long while and that is a good thing. I've been crush-free for three plus years now and I have armored my heart so strongly I doubt I will ever "like like" someone ever again. I feel like that old Pink Floyd song "Comfortably Numb."

My dream life is more active and vivid than my real life and if I see people in them I used to be fond of in real life there is a nice detachment to it that there never was when I actively liked them, if that makes sense. I found myself relieved to realize I was not in denial or anything like that, that my dreams were telling me, this is now in the rearview mirror and you are okay...in that area of your life.

As much as I can be very fearful of my dreams (and nightmares) I occasionally have very pleasant ones...last night I had my recurring dream (less and less these days, though) where I see my grandmother and get to hang out with her again.  My recurring mall dream felt less scary and more airy and I even had a dream where I got to play softball with Karen Carpenter (not a sad dream at all).

I  think you give away so much when you give away your heart, but I'm not sure the alternative is a much better option...just one I'm taking right now until I have surer footing in life.

One thing I'm sure of is that I'm not in denial about any past feelings for any past person. And this makes me think of one of many favorite Golden Girls scenes (I can pretty much apply any Golden Girls episode to different aspects of life and immediately feel better).

Dorothy: Rose, I am not in denial.

Rose: Yes, you are. You’re just denying you’re in denial.

Dorothy: Rose, honey, I am not denying I’m in denial.

Rose: If you’re not denying you’re in denial, then you’re in denial.

Dorothy: Look, fluffhead. Why should I deny being in denial? I never said I was in denial, YOU are the one who said I was in denial, and don’t you deny it.

Last night I had a very brief, but still kind of sweet, totally not unpleasant dream, something I rarely have. I wish now I'd written about it in my dream journal, right after waking. But I didn't so all I have left is a fleeting sensation rather than the bittersweet, but wonderful overwhelming-ness of it when I first woke.

I've always thought it looks so gentle and soul-stirring when someone kisses someone else on the top of their forehead or crown of their hair. I think it is very tender and that is how it was in my dream, with the person doing it to me, creating a loveliness I wanted to hold on to forever.

I've recently re-connected with an old friend. X and I first met in 1993 and were good friends for years, then kind of lost regular touch after he got married. 

He and his wife are no longer together, having divorced last year. My parents always had this mentality (and still have it) that married people cannot and should not be friends with the opposite gender. They are so adamant about this that even though I strongly disagree and believe that men and women can be "just friends," I think I let their attitude affect mine.

He and I have been texting and talking on the phone and he sent me a picture from the 90s, when we hung out together and had a lot of fun, going to the movies, amusement parks and day trips. After he sent it to me, he told me that he got it from a photo album his mom kept of the two of us. "My mom always liked you," he said.

This hit the part of me hard that always wanted to be "normal."  I guess maybe this didn't surprise me too much as his mother was always so nice to me. I still remember having a lovely time sitting at the same table with her at my friend's wedding.

Hearing X say this made me feel good, but also made me think that I think I always longed for the "extended family" part of normal more than the boyfriend/husband part of normal. And even though I couldn't want the normal that I wanted to want or if I had been someone who wanted that, there would still have been the "what's wrong with him that he says he likes me?" aspect.

I think if X and I had gotten married (he told me his mother actually told him she had hoped we would) that I would have gotten along well with his large and friendly family. His father was a little gruff, but still kind and X’s brothers and sisters always had such a welcoming aura. They all made me re-think that not all families are terribly dysfunctional.

A lot of people possibly hesitate to marry someone if that someone's family is "too much" or a stereotypical version of nosy, interfering and critical. Me? I liked X’s family so much I wanted to want to feel deep things for him. Because we were good friends and he loved dancing and cats as much as I do I thought I could will it to happen.

I looked at the picture he sent a lot the other night and I couldn't help but notice I looked happy, possibly even "radiant," a word no one ever could use to describe me now. I have no illusions about my looks, but that picture shows a me that is nowhere near as unattractive as I am now.

If I had a time machine, there are so many things I would want to go back and change or re-live. But then I remember how incredibly hard I tried (like really, really tried!) to conjure up romantic and emotional feelings that would have led to a good relationship and marriage and I know I just didn't have them.

One thing I would change in the 90s, though, is tell X that if I could have liked any man that way, it would have been him. He didn't know about me back then and I was so caught up in fear and trying to play a version of me that was a lie that I forgot about how lying hurt him. 

Years later,when I did come out to him, he said he wished he had known sooner, that it would have explained so many things and that, like me (but in a different way) he wouldn't have wanted things to be a way they just couldn't.

I have always had a very vivid and intense dream life so when I have nightmares they are actually quite horrible and when I have good dreams they are the kind of good dreams that are so good they hurt way more than the bad ones.

Last night I dreamed about someone I haven't seen in about 25 years. She and I used to be friends and I really, really liked her though I never would have ever shared that with her. That she appeared and everything felt so real and colorful only added to the weirdness of it all. I haven't consciously thought of her in a long time so that added a surprise element as well.

The most bizarre aspect is that I when I got up to use the bathroom and return to bed I would fall back asleep and the dream would continue. That almost never happens. If I didn't know better, between the vividness and continuity of it all I would swear it actually happened in real life.

What stung most, though, and worse than any nightmare could hit hard...was that she hugged me and I could feel it so intently that the sensation stayed with me hours after I woke.

 

When I first read Fifteen by Beverly Cleary back in the early, early 80s I would find myself frequently closing the book and looking at the cover (the 1980 Laurel Leaf Edition, specifically). Even at ten years old I knew this was the normal I was going to be expected to want in a just a few years:

I’m going to meet a boy, Jane Purdy told herself, as she walked up Blossom Street toward her babysitting job. Today I’m going to meet a boy. If she thought it often enough as if she really believed it, maybe she actually would meet a boy even though she was headed for Sandra Norton’s house and the worst babysitting job in Woodmont. If I don’t step on any cracks in the sidewalk all the way there, Jane thought, I’ll be sure to meet a boy. But avoiding cracks was silly, of course, and the sort of thing she had done when she was in the third grade. She was being just as silly as some of the other fifteen-year-old girls she knew, who counted red convertibles and believed they would go steady with the first boy they saw after the hundredth red convertible. Counting convertibles and not stepping on cracks were no way to meet a boy.

Maybe, when she finished her job with Sandra, she could walk down to Nibley’s Confectionery and Soda Fountain and sit at the counter and order a chocolate Coke float; and if she sipped it very, very slowly, a new boy might happen to come in and sit down beside her. He would be at least sixteen—old enough to have a driver’s license—and he would have crinkles around his eyes that showed he had a sense of humor and he would be tall, the kind of boy all the other girls would like to date. Their eyes would meet in the mirror behind the milk shake machines, and he would smile and she would smile back and he would turn to her and look down (down—that was important) and grin and say . . 

I also knew, though, despite how young I was, that I was more drawn to the girl on the cover than the boy, though I didn't know why that pull towards others of my own gender existed within me...and wouldn't know the reasons for quite some time ahead.

Because of my growing up in the 70s and 80s, certain kinds of knowledge were completely inaccessible to me. Sometimes I wonder if I would have been better off as a preteen later on life when "Googling" became possible. Just perhaps...not knowing things would not have created such a sense of isolation and overwhelming "what on earth is wrong with me?" thoughts.

Even now, even at the age of 55, I still want to want what is normal, what society not only approves of, but still shoves down the throats of anyone who isn't straight.

I want to want what is normal, what I'm supposed to want, truly, but I just don't have the feelings expected of me. And it's taken me decades to realize I am not a bad person because of that. If I am a bad person (which I often think I am) it is for entirely different reasons.

Back in the beginning of 2025 I decided to do dry January and then went from month to month still going dry. I slipped in my intentions in September and started my two drinks a night habit again, though "habit" seems way too innocuous a word for something that can cause so many serious problems. 

Last week I decided enough was enough and that I could kid myself all I wanted about alcohol not being that bad or alcohol probably not causing cancer if I made up for the bad in other areas of my life. I want to be healthy for my cat and I told him I would not be drinking any more and even though I know he doesn't understand my words I still find it works to be accountable to him. I love him more than anything and want to be able to take care of him. And he is the only being I know to whom I have never lied.

Another thing about drinking is that I managed to kid myself about what is heavy drinking and what isn't. I'm not going to say I thought two drinks a night was harmless, but I also never stopped to think that any more than 8 drinks a week for women is indeed heavy drinking. That woke me up and I'm hoping that this time sticks, even if I'm starting from scratch all over again.

...

It's the next day and I just want to add that I feel like I'm doing much better without wine, both health-wise and mentally. Instead of using alcohol to relax at night I am now taking an herb called Passionflower and drinking oat milk with it. The combo is not as potent as wine but I still relax (well as much as I'm capable of relaxing) and feel a bit float-y.

I’m watching an old episode of Everybody loves Raymond and Marie has confessed that she likes Amy better than Debra because Amy is a virgin… Marie even goes as far as to say that Amy is “pure” and a “good girl.” (I think the writers were trying to show antiquated Marie’s thinking, but I’m not sure that was the point but if it was, the topic was kind of clumsily handled if you ask me.)

A woman’s goodness has absolutely nothing to do with whether she has had sex or not. I’m a virgin and I don’t consider myself pure at all. I’ve done things in my life I’m truly and deeply ashamed of, even if I definitely would change them if I could. 

Meanwhile, there are women who aren’t virgins who are good people. How on earth did we develop this mindset that a woman’s purity is dependent on whether she’s had sex or not and how come this isn’t applied to men?

Virginity is not a moral achievement. It’s a neutral state. A person who has had sex has not lost goodness; a virgin has not gained it. Morality is about how we treat others, with kindness, honesty and respect, not about what we do or don’t do with our own bodies.

The “purity” myth lets people confuse a lack of sexual experience with moral character, and it’s harmful to everyone, including the people it claims to “praise.”

I recently discovered a book written in 1890 called The Young Visiters. Daisy Ashford penned the novel as 9 year old and later, in her 20s, shared it for publication, through a rather complicated, but interesting series of circumstances. 

Part of the book's success in selling millions of copies had to do with a child’s bluntness in describing adult vulnerabilities.

What strikes me most is not the book itself (although it is uncannily mature for a child of her age to write, misspellings and all) but what the writer said years later:

 “I can never feel all the nice things that have been said about ‘The Young Visiters’ are really due to me at all, but to a Daisy Ashford of so long ago that she seems another person."

I am by no means a Jane Austen fan, yet I find this book fascinating and actually kind of funny:

from Kindle Highlights:

When I say “ruin,” I don’t mean the way you might, say, ruin a silk blouse by chasing a cat into a juniper bush. I mean the way you might ruin the song “Total Eclipse of the Heart” by telling someone that Bonnie Tyler originally meant it to be about vampires (this is true). I’ve now upended whatever uncomplicated associations you had with this song, and you’ll never be able to hear it without thinking of vampires again, but I’ve made it much more interesting. Anyway, English professors have lots of tools at our disposal for ruining your favorite books, and the way I prefer to ruin Pride and Prejudice is by pointing out how literature trains women to spend their time changing assholes into sensitive men instead of overthrowing the patriarchy.

.....>

my students like me even though I ruin it. They tell me I’m “relatable” and “super sweet and nerdy” (this was in an anonymous online review, and honestly, how very dare you). They also once said I was “the best birth control.” (That was when I was hugely, embarrassingly pregnant. Like, I texted a picture of myself to one of my best friends and instead of responding with “you’re glowing” or even “so excited,” she wrote back, “you look like a UFO.”) The birth control comment is not really related to my habit of ruining Pride and Prejudice, but I think it gives you a sense of what it’s like to study Jane Austen with me. That is, taking a class with me is all fun and games until you’re hugging your roommate in the English department lounge because you realized that you’ve been spending your time and energy and attention on taciturn or emotionally unavailable people, believing they are going to turn out to be slow-burn romantic heroes like Mr. Darcy—when really, they are often just assholes.

More spring cleaning and more journal finding yesterday…I found a 2000 journal wedged behind one of my drawers that I have not seen in years and thought I had lost a long time ago.

Sitting down and reading through it I realized it is the most detailed of my diaries and, though I have little confidence in so many things, probably the best written of all the journals I kept.

I had forgotten my early 00s extensive social life and I enjoyed reading about times with my coworkers much earlier on in a job that sometimes doesn't give me as much joy as it used to do. 

Though I tend to remember my times with my niece because they were such happy times I'm glad there are details about those times as well. She was such a delight as a child and I feel blessed that she and I are friends now as adults.

As my diaries move into the late 00s and early 10s they become less event-driven and more internal and more bleak. I regret now not writing about events or things that happened in my life then. There are a few, like the time I saw someone I knew at Whole Foods and hid behind a display because of fear and shame from a decades old event.

Plus, I still find myself wishing I had kept a diary in high school...I think it would help me remember things. I'm not sure it's normal to have complete blank pages in your mind's memory for any time before adulthood.

…on vacation this week and using it to stay home and catch up on things and to clean and hang out with my cat.

In my de-cluttering of my closet I found an old box I didn’t even remember having: it has diaries from the mid to late 00s. 

Looking at them now, I think I was probably more mentally and emotionally off back then than I am now, but in a personal way, not in a political way like I am now.

It’s already my fifth day off and I still have so much to do. Plus, I’ve gotten lost in the world that is Substack and I have a pile of books I still want to finish reading.

The more I see how amazing so many writers online are the more I’m like ‘why write,’ but then I realize I write to try and heal, not because I think I have anything to say. 

There are so many, many good writers in the world and I want more time so I can read them but there are so many other things to be done first though.

That is why I just don’t understand boredom. Boredom seems like such a luxury in a world where free time is hard to come by for a lot of people.

The Story of the Garden of Eden. It’s a neat, tidy tale with a clear moral: Adam was minding his own business, Eve was curious and disobedient, ate the fruit, and doomed humanity forever.

But if you dig a little deeper into the Midrash—the ancient Jewish commentaries that fill in the gaps of the Torah—you find another story. A story that was literally too wild, too powerful, and too threatening to make it into the final cut of the Bible. It’s the story of Lilith.

And it’s the story of how we’ve been demonizing women for simply owning themselves ever since.

The story goes that in the very beginning, God didn’t create Eve from Adam’s rib. Instead, He created them equally, at the same time, from the dust of the earth. This was Lilith, the first woman.

Imagine it: two beings, formed of the same stuff, standing on the same ground. For a while, it worked. But soon, a power struggle emerged. According to the medieval text The Alphabet of Ben Sira, the argument came to a head over something incredibly basic: their sex life. Adam wanted Lilith to always lie beneath him. Lilith refused.

“Why should I lie beneath you,” she asked, “when we are both equal, created from the same dust?”

Adam, not loving this challenge to his authority, tried to force the issue. And Lilith, in a moment of sheer, audacious power, spoke the unspeakable name of God, grew wings, and flew away from the garden. She chose exile over subjugation.

God sent three angels to bring her back, with a warning: if she didn’t return, one hundred of her children would die every day. Lilith, choosing her own freedom over a life of subservience, still refused to go back to a life beneath Adam.

And that’s when the propaganda machine started.

Suddenly, Lilith wasn’t a woman fighting for equality. She was a demon. A succubus. A murderer of infants. A creature of the night who threatened the sanctity of the patriarchal family unit. History’s first feminist was re-branded as history’s first monster.

With Lilith gone, God tried again. This time, He used Adam’s rib. A bone from his side, not dust from the ground. She was created from him, for him. The Hebrew term often translated as “helpmeet” or “helper” is ezer kenegdo, which can also mean “power alongside,” but the context of her creation from his rib certainly implies a secondary, derivative status.

And yet, even this more “compliant” version of womanhood wasn’t safe from blame.

We all know what happened next. The serpent, the fruit, the temptation. But look at how the story is read. Eve was deceived. She was tricked. Adam, who was standing right there with her according to the text, ate the fruit without any recorded protest.

But who gets the blame? Who carries the weight of "The Fall" for the next several millennia? Eve.

The name itself became a slur. She became the archetype for female weakness, curiosity, and the inherent danger of feminine wiles. St. Paul later used her to justify the subjugation of women in the early church: “I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner.”

With these few words, Eve’s mistake became a life sentence for every woman who came after her. The narrative was set: women were intellectually inferior, morally weaker, and a constant source of temptation. If Eve hadn't messed up, we'd still be in paradise. Thanks a lot, Eve.

When you look at these two stories side-by-side, a chilling pattern emerges.

Lilith refused to be subservient. She demanded equality. The result? She was labeled a demon, a threat to the natural order, a creature to be feared and whose name should never be spoken.

Eve accepted her secondary status (or had it built into her very origin). She made a mistake. The result? She was labeled a sinner, a scapegoat for all of humanity’s problems, and the "proof" that women needed to be controlled.

There was no winning.

If you demand to be seen as an equal, you are an unnatural monster (a Lilith). If you exist within the system and make a single error, you are the reason for all the world’s pain (an Eve).

This isn't just ancient mytholog, it is also the blueprint for how Western society has treated women for centuries. It’s the virgin/whore dichotomy, the Madonna/whore complex. Be pure, be quiet, be submissive—but if you fail in the tiniest way, you are the original source of all sin. And if you dare to speak up and demand to be seen as a full human being, you are a hysterical, difficult, or dangerous woman.

It’s why women in power are often described as "bossy" or "cold" while men are "assertive" and "strong." It’s why a woman’s mistakes are magnified and her character is attacked, while a man’s are often excused as "boys will be boys."

In the 1970s, the Jewish feminist movement adopted Lilith as a symbol. They saw her not as a demon, but as the first independent woman. They started Lilith Magazine to give voice to a feminist Jewish perspective. They took the monster the patriarchy created and reclaimed her as a hero.

It’s a powerful act: to look at the stories we’ve been told and ask, "Who benefits from this narrative?"

Lilith was demonized for being her own person. Eve was villainized for making a choice in a system rigged against her. They are two sides of the same coin—the "good woman" and the "bad woman"—both designed to keep women in line.

So the next time you hear the story of the Garden of Eden, remember Lilith, who flew away. Remember Eve, who bore the blame for millions. And remember that the urge for freedom, the desire for equality, and the courage to make choices, even the wrong ones, isn't demonic. It’s human.

Maybe it’s time we stopped demonizing women for being exactly that.

Three cups of black coffee in me today and I'm wondering why my heart is thumping so much. I make the connection between the two, obviously, but somehow I always forget and I still end up over caffeinated. 

I don't sleep very well and so coffee has been a necessary evil in my life for decades now. It also used to help me lower my appetite and weight, but not so much as I get older.

Oddly enough, though, I do find black coffee curbs my sugar fix need. I thought it was in my head, but then I looked it up:

Yes, there is a strong link between drinking black coffee and reduced sugar cravings, primarily because it helps stabilize blood sugar and suppresses appetite. The caffeine and compounds like chlorogenic acid can increase metabolism, promote fat-burning, and reduce hunger, which helps curb the desire for sweet, calorie-dense foods. 

Key Connections Between Black Coffee and Lower Sugar Intake:

• Appetite Suppression: Coffee, particularly black, can boost metabolism and reduce hunger, making you less likely to crave sugary snacks.
• Hormonal Regulation: Drinking black coffee can increase levels of serotonin, which suppresses appetite, and decrease the hunger-inducing hormone ghrelin.
• No Added Sugar: By drinking black coffee, you eliminate the daily intake of sugar and cream, which can prevent the cycle of craving more sugar later in the day.
• Improved Insulin Sensitivity: While high caffeine intake can cause short-term spikes in some, long-term black coffee consumption is associated with better blood sugar control and a lower risk of type 2 diabetes. 

 

I'm reading Where Sleeping Girls Lie and this passage hits hard:

It was hard to think that you might never see someone again. Though, with her luck, you might see them again, in your daydreams and nightmares.

There have been at least three people in my lifetime I knew I would never see again and it hurt so much the pain took a long time to go away. And though I truly never have seen them again, they do indeed show up in my dreams and nightmares.

 

(Written with my input and details I gave AI, but still with AI...I'm currently working on a version of this without any AI at all...I'm trying to get back to writing fiction again...back in the early 90s I used to love writing Quantum Leap fan fiction and posting it a Prodigy Quantum Leap fan board.

Even though I like Maddie's character a lot on School Spirits, I like Rhonda the most and was trying to write a story about her from a new character's point of view.)

The fluorescent lights in the hallway near the old home economics room flickered like they always did: annoying, eternal, stuck in 1992 or whenever the bulb last gave up. Charley was wandering, half-listening to the distant echo of the pep rally that never quite reached the ghosts anymore, when he noticed her.

She was sitting cross-legged against the wall, knees drawn up, long chestnut hair falling over her face like a curtain. A faded denim jacket with tiny embroidered flowers on the shoulders, acid-washed jeans, high-top sneakers that had once been white. She looked... early '80s. Not Wally's flashy football-jock '83, but quieter. Smaller.

She didn't look up when he stopped.

"Hey," Charley said gently. "You... new around here? Or old new?"

The girl flinched, shoulders hunching tighter. After a long beat she whispered, "I'm not new. I've always been here."

Charley crouched a few feet away, giving her space. "I'm Charley. Died in the cafeteria. Long story involving fries and a really bad day. You got a name?"

"Holly," she said so softly he almost missed it. "Holly Whitaker. Class of... '82, I think. I stopped counting after a while."

Charley's eyebrows shot up. "Eighty-two? That's before Wally. He's '84—football field, big tackle gone wrong. He's been here since then and he's met pretty much everyone. How have we never...?"

Holly finally lifted her head. Pale eyes, tired. "I didn't want to be met. I stayed out of the way. Library stacks. Back stairwells. The costume loft above the auditorium when no one was looking. People didn't notice me when I was alive. Turns out being invisible carries over."

Charley sat fully now, legs crossed. "Wallflowers gotta stick together, I guess. Come on. There's a group. We meet in the theater sometimes. No pressure, but... you don't have to keep hiding."

She shook her head fast. "I can't. I don't even know how I-I wake up every day thinking maybe today I'll remember. Maybe today it'll click and I can... go. But it's been-" Her voice cracked. "Over forty years. I still feel like I just got here. Like I should be cramming for midterms or avoiding eye contact in the cafeteria. Not this."

Charley reached out instinctively, then remembered: no touch. He let his hand drop. "Yeah. That part doesn't get easier. But you're not alone in the stuck feeling."

He convinced her to walk with him. Slowly. Like coaxing a stray cat.

When they reached the theater, Wally was already there, sprawled in a front-row seat, tossing a ghostly football up and catching it. Rhonda leaned against the stage, flipping through an ancient copy of The Bell Jar she'd read approximately four hundred times. Quinn sat nearby, headphones on, sketching something abstract on their leg with a finger that left no mark.

Wally sat up straight when he saw them. "Charley? Who's the new kid?"

"Not new," Charley said. "Old. Holly. Class of '82. Apparently she's been our invisible neighbor this whole time."

Wally blinked. "Eighty-two? Dude. I've been here since '83 and I swear I've never seen you."

Holly shrank back toward the aisle. "I... stayed quiet."

Rhonda snapped the book shut. "Quiet's a choice. Also a survival skill. I get it." She hopped off the stage and walked over, sizing Holly up without hostility, just curiosity. "You look like you're still waiting for the bell to ring so you can disappear to lunch. Been there."

Quinn pulled off the headphones. "Hi. I'm Quinn. Bus crash, '04. Took me forever to even talk to anyone. You're okay."

Holly managed a tiny nod.

Charley gestured everyone closer. "Holly's having a hard time remembering. Or accepting. Any of it. Maybe we can help her figure out what happened? Like we did with... well, everything else around here."

Wally rubbed the back of his neck. "I mean, I don't remember seeing you around back then, but I was kind of... loud. Football guys weren't exactly subtle. If you were in the shadows, I probably ran right past you."

"I was," Holly said. "Always. I liked the darkroom. Developing pictures no one would ever see. I was working on a project the day it happened. Something about light and memory. Ironic, right?" She laughed once, hollow. "I remember walking down the hall after last bell. Feeling... off. Dizzy. Like the floor was tilting. Then nothing. Just waking up here. Same clothes. Same headache that never leaves."

Rhonda tilted her head. "Dizzy. Hallway. No blood, no crash, no obvious trauma. Could be medical. Aneurysm. Heart thing. Stroke. Sometimes it's quiet."

"Or someone," Quinn added softly. "Pushed down stairs. Locked somewhere. People hide bodies, or death, sometimes."

Holly shivered. "I don't want to think someone hated me enough to... I wasn't worth hating. I was barely worth noticing."

Wally leaned forward, elbows on knees. "Hey. Being a wallflower doesn't make you worthless. It just means the world was too loud for you. Doesn't mean you deserved whatever happened."

Rhonda crossed her arms. "We're gonna walk your last day. Step by step. Darkroom to hallway to wherever it ended. If there's a scar, your scar, we'll find it. Stare it down until it gives up the truth."

Charley smiled at Holly. "You don't have to do it alone. We're good at this by now. Ghosts gotta stick together."

Holly looked around at them: Wally's earnest grin, Rhonda's guarded kindness, Quinn's quiet solidarity, Charley's gentle patience, and for the first time in four decades, she didn't feel quite so see-through.

"Okay," she whispered. "But... slowly?"

"Slowly," Rhonda promised.

They started walking. Out of the theater, down the dim corridors, toward the place where Holly's life had quietly ended and her afterlife had quietly begun. Somewhere in the walls of Split River High, a forgotten truth was waiting. And this time, someone was finally looking for it.