Greek yogurt is yogurt that's essentially in a concentrated form. It's like drinking orange juice concentrate in lieu of fresh squeezed orange juice. If you've ever eaten it, its consistency is like that of spackle, therefore as such, it's a much less appealing dairy treat to most than traditional Yoplait.
If you were to consider the ingredients of Greek yogurt, you'd find a LOT more milk is needed to concoct it than its much less pricey (& mainstream) cousin.
The benefit to choosing Greek yogurt though over regular is the added nutrition. It's like running versus walking (for the same period of time) relative to the exercise benefits. Of course, running is much harder (I love to hate to run) than walking, and similarly, Greek yogurt is much less palatable (sans added sugars) compared to regular yogurt.
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My first Silas (pre-Samson Society) came into my life sometime during 2010, and it wasn't long before he made an insightful statement that made quite the impact. And that was that I felt things deeply. Deeper than most, if not every individual he'd befriended within the past.
I didn't dispute his claim for deep down I think I'd always known this about myself, yet it was unsettling to consider.
When I was a teenager, I banked all of my emotions into popular music. My pride & joy, back then, was my component audio system - consisting of amplifier, CD player, dual cassette deck, and two Bose speakers (which I still use today). God love my parents for putting up with the ruckus day in and day out coming from my 110 sf bedroom. I absolutely have no idea how they stood it within our +/-1,800 sf rancher (their bedroom was adjacent to mine).
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Lakeside Pres is hosting a 2021 fall / spring book study that started yesterday evening, and the selected tome is sort of a modern day encyclopedia of false religions. Last night's meeting was centered on the theology of Jehovah's Witnesses. Next month's will be on The Church of Scientology or some such.
As expected, the presentation was affably cerebral in the truest Lakeside Presbyterian fashion, but unexpectedly, taking the subject matter at hand into consideration, I came away feeling quite the hollower for it. Hence, I felt there was just too little (if any) heart (compassion) whatsoever pertaining to the lost souls indirectly referenced throughout the subject matter. In spite of the fact that personally, Jehovah's Witnesses are about as familiar to me as Freemasons.
Needless to say, I'm willing to bet a dollar that D. James Kennedy would have been none too pleased at the tone. As such, I have to ask myself, why does that matter specifically to me?
I have to believe it harkens back to Greek yogurt.
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Taking all of this into consideration, me thinks I've spotted a huge misnomer (mistake) relative to the massive pull I have at times towards consuming gay porn, and that may just be the word community. This being a word I've often utilized in the past to describe some form of justification relative to porn consumption. Instead, I'm beginning to wonder if this pull has more to do with emotion or feeling and the aforementioned "banking" of said feelings.
Combined with that, and this almost seems to qualify as weirdly transcendental, could be the notion of concentrating emotionally onto or into the images in an almost empathic manner.
All that to say, I'm now convinced that its pull is far more emotional than me simply wanting to be communal. And it likely always has been.
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Moving in a somewhat different direction, though still referencing Rob's (always concentrated) emotional state of mind, I offer this in order to conclude this post:
Dignity is an important, if not the most important term that I find myself always equating to my understanding of / respectfulness towards women. I'm fortunate to have a mother who's dignified as well as a wife who follows suit. As such, growing up and then being married to a dignified woman has firmly cemented my point of view. I pray that my three daughters will someday follow the example of these important ladies.
This factors into why straight porn is so repulsive to me. The women within these videos / images are so often in line with what I saw at Wal-Mart earlier this week (more on that below), not to mention the disgustingly abusive circumstances they're typically presented within.
All in all, I can think of no more repulsive sight than seeing a woman's face ejaculated on as her blank stare is forever memorialized on camera. I mean, can you imagine, your daughter's face in that spot without wanting to extradite yourself from planet Earth? I feel so sorry for the Spielbergs.
To circle back to that woman at Wal-Mart, you should know that she's what served to spearhead this post. Hence, if you've not taken a liking to what you've read so far, blame her.
Wal-Mart represents the most convenient, most cost effective means of purchasing just about anything & everything. Its no-frills approach to retail draws consumers from every walk of life. Its sister store, Sam's Club, takes an identical approach. And I frequent both of these retail establishments quite frequently, particularly now that my wife is disabled (traditional grocery stores' footprint is smaller / easier to navigate).
A few days ago, I spotted a woman moving through the Wal-Mart self-checkout line who was around age 35-40. She was a white woman, overweight yet average height, and dressed in nondescript clothing that looked shockingly too small for her build. The shorts she was wearing, in particular, were cut so short and were so tight, that they actually looked painful to my eyes. Her hair looked like it had been cut with a weed whacker after it had been formed into a handful of dreadlocks that extended down her back. To add to that, snippets of pastel hair dye had been added to these ratty strands which only added to her completely disheveled appearance. Had she been 18-years-old instead of +/-35 (on Halloween), this look might have been less of a radical embodiment, but she clearly was no longer a teenager (& Halloween is more than a month away).
And then there was her skin. It was almost as pale as my sweet wife's, therefore each of the brightly colored, ginormous tattoos that she'd had imprinted squarely on each limb was impossible to miss. They literally were glowing with color - greens, reds, blues - against her milky derma.
I could not take my eyes off of this woman while she went through her self-checkout paces. The shock was too great. The disbelief too paralyzing.
As I was walking out of the store, I actually ran into my Silas' wife who recognized me from her car. We spoke briefly, yet in looking back, I'm sure my responses were no doubt unusual, having just prior witnessed such the unidentifiable alien-like creature.
This is what kept coming to mind repeatedly for days after: If we were to turn back the clock 40 years, would I have witnessed a woman presenting herself as such at my local Mississippi big box retailer (TG&Y)? Were there women that looked like this woman back in 1981 here in Mississippi?
If not, why are they here now? What "birthed" these women? What are their origins, and where are they headed? Why in the world would a woman choose to present herself to the world as this woman was?
To me, they have zero dignity, therefore all I see when I encounter them is me being helpless towards their situation. For dignity comes from within. It isn't like respect or shame that's administered (on)to someone. Dignity is knowing your intrinsic value as a _______, _______, _______, and so forth.
+/-18 years ago, a lesbian couple constructed a home within our 'hood, and they're still both living there (within a reconstructed version necessitated by a housefire). My emotional experience relative to engaging with these women was initially in line with what I've described above regarding this fellow Wal-Mart patron.
Lesbianism is a complete affront to my understanding of feminine dignity, and it always has been. Therefore, my heart breaks and is angered / outraged / confused whilst seeing it lived out.
Especially my Greek yogurt heart.
Help me Lord with these feelings, and to be more specific, synchronize them with your own. But especially in magnitude. For I'm so often at their disposal. Even as a 49-year-old.
Where do I bank these?
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