Who will you be when history calls?

May 29, 2026 Savvy Spoonie Leave a comment

This is a picture of the American Flag with the statement "History is calling" on it.

Trevor Noah asks this several times in his recent Netflix special and it hits so hard. As someone who has had to redefine myself due to chronic illness, I am well aware of how much work goes into actively choosing who you are going to be.

If you live in the United States of America today can you really think of a better time to put in that work?

Our very way of life is under attack. Not rhetorically, not by diversity or advancement, or immigration, or change, but by rich, white men intentionally dismantling it while we fight over bathrooms.

So who are you?

Are you someone who ignores what’s happening and just lives their life?

Are you someone who thinks that they will benefit from what is happening and is helping them destroy our nation?

Or are you a fighter, a resistor, dare I say a patriot? Someone who is willing to fight to take this country back from these maniacs?

Think of the pledge of allegiance. As GenX I spoke it every single school morning, hand over my heart, while it was read over the loudspeaker.

I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Liberty and justice for all.

Every single day I swore a pledge to a flag that stood for liberty and justice for all. Everyone. Every single person in a supposedly indivisible nation.

It didn’t say “Liberty and justice for whites” or “Liberty and justice for citizens” or “Liberty and justice for the rich”.

Liberty and justice for all.

So I am choosing to fight for the rights of my fellow Americans, and the immigrants that have come here, like my ancestors before them, seeking a better life. I am choosing for fight for equality, for science, for diversity, for all the things that actually make this country great.

I am choosing to fight for my flag.

That is what being an American means. Standing up for liberty and justice for all. So many of our countrymen have let the ultra-wealthy asshats in charge convince them otherwise.

But I’m GenX and I am here to tell you that you are acting like the Russians in a bad 80’s movie if you are still supporting Donald Trump. You are not the good guys in this story. You have lost the narrative. There is simply no other way to write your choice.

It’s not too late to make a different choice though.

So who are you going to choose to be? History is calling.

Chronic pain

A choice to keep going anyway.

March 18, 2026 Savvy Spoonie Leave a comment

That’s where I ended up.

After 15 years of tests, medication failures, painful treatments, expensive doctors.

I ended up with a diagnosis science poorly understands and a palliative care team.

And a choice to keep going anyway.

I am in pain every day. All day every day. Sometimes the pain is only as distracting as a well behaved toddler while you’re at the grocery store. It demands my attention constantly but doesn’t melt down. If I apply mindfulness techniques I can accept it’s presence and live with it along side me.

While I paint, clean, have coffee, exercise, socialize, drive, care for others, whatever I do.

Some days it’s a teenager who is out hours past curfew. Keeping me from sleep as I toss and turn waiting for the magical moment I can actually safely drop off.

It is never gone and there is no cure for it.

My life got livable again when I stopped looking for one and accepted my pain as part of my existence. When I relearned my body’s limitations and stopped trying to recover my old me.

When I made the choice to keep going anyway.

Chronic pain

I am never, ever, ever

March 10, 2026 Savvy Spoonie Leave a comment

Getting better.

The slow inevitable decline of a progressive illness is hard to quantify especially when the illness in question gives you “good days” and “bad days” to begin with.

It can be difficult to notice the fact that it takes longer and longer to recover from the flu, or infusions, or too much physical activity.

The bounce back doesn’t dramatically swing from bouncy to flat. It’s more like a basketball, inevitably bouncing a little less high each time it hits the ground.

Right now I’m noticing my ball is flatter than it used to be. It’s taking me longer to recover from infusions, longer to get over colds. I run out of energy sooner on my good days.

It’s possible it’s a flare up. They can last for years after all. However it’s just as possible that I’m declining, slowly, incrementally, as my disease devours healthy nerve endings and my autonomic system loses coping mechanisms.

It’s scary and it’s depressing.

Today I’m struggling to find the silver lining.