Pork Chop Biscuit

Recently, Kelly Clarkson received a lot of heat about her pretty substantial weight gain in recent months. The result was a professional and positive response by Clarkson and a social media flood of reverse-fat shaming. I figured that as a person who has fallen into both the fit and fat columns (mostly the latter), I'd weigh in here.

If you're fat, you most likely know it. How you handle this knowledge is personal. For Kelly Clarkson, the response to critics of her larger size was great:

"I've just never cared what people think. It's more if I'm happy and I'm confident and feeling good. That's always been my thing. And more so now since having a family, I don't seek out any other acceptance." - Kelly Clarkson

Opinions on what obesity actually looks like varies wildly from person to person. Fortunately, the trend of rail-thin women as the model for attractiveness has fallen to the margins, replaced by the increasingly popular fascination with curvy women. However, I think that we are blurring the lines between confidence, as in one's self-confidence regardless of body image, and making excuses for unhealthy lifestyles, obesity, and more.

Love Letter

I have wanted to write to you for a few weeks now, but couldn't really figure out the right words to say to you. You are the only woman that I have ever loved, but have never met. I had never seen a woman as beautiful as you are, and the only picture I ever saw of you was on an ultrasound.

Now, I hope that I have found the right words for you.

The Audacity

I have to give it up to my Facebook friends for inspiring this post, as well as contributing to it (knowingly or not). It all started with an article that I read about recent scientific findings related to religion. The article, which you can read here, discusses a recent issue in the journal Cognitive Science, in which it was found that children subjected to religion have a difficult time differentiating reality and make-believe. Surprise, surprise.

I'm agnostic at best but was very pleased with the discussion that took place between my Facebook friends when I posted the article there. The main players in the conversation were me, a close personal friend for more than 20 years named Bryan, and a brilliant local comedian that I hold in high regard for his humor, humility, and powerful intelligence: Bill Kilpatrick. I am on the anti-religion side, Bryan falls on the pro-religion side, and Bill is somewhere in the middle, too informed for his own good. Here is how it went:

How To Consume A Child

Recently, the people of Florida were shocked when a 14-year-old girl by the name of Rebecca Sedwick tragically took her own life due to the ravages of cyber-bullying and other difficulties with particular kids at her school. The details surrounding her death are tragic at best and enraging at worst. 

Any child lost is a failure of human beings as a species; either we failed to protect our offspring or we produced offspring that we could never protect in the first place. However, I am personally at an impasse about how I feel regarding this terrible situation.