If you needed another reason to get money and power

I am happy and in love.

Early on he told me that he was a great boyfriend. He said he was particularly giving, thoughtful, patient, slow-to-anger, generous. I don’t know whether I rolled my eyes physically or just in my head. But I know I saved my biting commentary for a fight. “That attitude, that you’re perfect and it’s other people who need to change, it’s factually wrong and it’s antithetical to growth.”

But it is I who was wrong. Because as big as the game he talks is, the one he walks is bigger.

I’ve been listening to the album It Goes Like This by Thomas Rhett. It’s full of songs about about how into a girl he is. And I smile to myself thinking that that’s how my love feels about me.

There’s so much I didn’t get about relationships when I was younger. There’s so much I regret about the way I treated my early loves. It’s amazing to me how quickly my love catches on. Last night he asked me about work. I answered vaguely, because I hate to be a bore. But he prodded in the most loving, beautiful way. “I want to hear more about the pieces you’re writing.” He reminded me that while some of what I’m working on is interesting in and of itself, some of it is interesting to him because it’s mine. When I got upset about something petty the night before, he listened to me, apologized sincerely and worked to fix it. He gives (and gives) in bed even when he’s too tired to get. He goes out of his way for me. This is the shit that makes a relationship work. I didn’t get that when I was younger. I’m impressed he gets it already.

When I look back at my relationships, I see a lot of regret. But it’s made me a better person, because I work hard to have different regrets in the future. Part of my annoyance with his positive self-regard is rooted in jealousy. Kind of a feeling of, “How dare you feel good about yourself.” But he’s right to feel good about himself. Because he’s good. And I would do well to feel good about myself, because I’m good too. People work to prove that the the image they have of themselves and the image they think others have of them is accurate. If I think he and I are shitty partners, we’ll be shitty partners. But if I think he and I are good partners, people who are imperfect but trying really hard and getting better all the time, then that’s what we’ll work hard to be.

On to the links!

FEE has a slick new website, the design of which has been overseen by the incomparable Jeffrey Tucker. And the first article published on the new FEE? Mine, bitches! Check out New York State’s Airbnb Ban Demonstrates How Regulation Actually Works.

“The New York State Senate recently effectively banned Airbnb in the state. SB S6340A makes advertising short-term rentals (less than 30 days) of entire homes illegal. Short-term rentals definitely raise legitimate safety and nuisance concerns for neighbors. But these can easily be dealt with privately with homeowners’ associations and lease agreements. Unfortunately, legal restrictions on short-term rentals are, in practice, pure rent seeking on the part of the hotel industry and leave consumers considerably worse off.”

This video will restore your faith in humanity.

“I…hate food. I hate that it makes me feel shitty about myself, I hate that it’s a thing that often seems to control me instead of the other way around. I hate that, even when I have so much of my control back (thanks, Wellbutrin), I still struggle with this demon. I still live with that constant fear that it will take over again, and I feel like every choice is a step further away or back towards that wide-open, gaping mouth.

“I hate what it does to me. I hate the way it makes me feel about myself. I hate that it’s the reason why I still struggle to look at myself in the mirror, why I am in a situation of longing for something I may not be able to have.”

Gina Luttrell perfectly describes something I feel but have never heard articulated. I appreciate good food, but it’s not something I’m really going to spend time or energy on. Food is a necessary evil. I hate food. I hate how I feel about it, how anxious it makes me. How inferior. I feel like no matter what I choose I’m fucking up somehow.

And I hate how I can’t talk about it. No matter what I say I’m going to be judged by someone, and there’s no right answer.

I look this way due to a combination of genetics I can’t take credit for and anxiety about getting fat which I’m ashamed about because there’s nothing wrong with being fat and some food choices that were good and healthy and some food choices that were for the purpose of staying within the narrow weight range society has decided a woman can inhabit without being harassed and derided for existing.

“I wanted to ask them what they expected an extremely rich, attractive 48-year-old woman to look like. A broiled steak? The inside of Keith Richard’s asshole? But I said nothing. I looked at Celine’s serene face and I felt love for all these people.”

This might not be the best thing you read all year, but it will definitely be the best thing you read all day.

This is some fucked-up shit.

“Just so we’re all clear, if you criticize the way another woman expresses her feminism, you aren’t a feminist, you’re a judgmental brat.” -@thetigersez

Couples Who Divide Housework Equally Have More Sex If you need more reason than, to not live in fucking filth.

@mbsycamore makes precisely the point I made in my last go on Don’t Worry About the Government: “Reminder: any legislation that relies on the terrorism watch list is racist and discriminatory, even if it pretends to be ‘gun control.’”

Speaking of gun control, yesterday the Pirate asked if I wanted an AR-10 or AR-15 receiver. I went with the 10 cuz it’s bigger. #sizequeen #onlyforfirearms

Annnd, if you needed another reason to get money and power: Money improves sex lives of older women, study finds, via @OMGchronicles