We had a real working fireplace, at the house I grew up in. Not a gas log but a regular old-fashioned, wood-burning fireplace protected by a glass screen you could pull open if you were allowed, which we never were. We might shatter the glass by playing with it, and then we’d need stitches and a tetanus shot. I didn’t think of that fireplace as as an oddity. Everyone I read about in books had fireplaces, after all. But I’ve never... Read more
 Let’s talk about Mary Magdalene. In the Eastern Church, Mary Magdalene’s icon is nice and dignified-looking. She’s all decked out in red, holding an ointment jar or an egg, and she’s staring authoritatively forward as one does in an icon. In the West, Mary Magdalene is portrayed in any number of ways, but I most often see her crying– most often of all, crying at Jesus’s bare feet. Many have pointed out that we don’t specifically know the sinful... Read more
 Somehow I’ve attracted the ire of no less than Professor David Upham. Up until last night, when he commented on a facebook re-sharing of my blog post from earlier this week, I didn’t know who David Upham was; apparently he’s a professor at the University of Dallas and has written a book on dating and marriage which Crisis Magazine really liked. It looks okay. It doesn’t look like a book that would interest me very much, but it doesn’t look... Read more
 I worked in a Catholic daycare, over a decade ago, in one of the places I have lived. It was a summer enriched daycare for older children who were usually in elementary school; they were cooped together in classrooms meant for much younger children from eight in the morning until six– or after six, when we locked up the building and were paid overtime to wait with tired children for wayward late parents. As far as skills and as... Read more
 It’s been more than a week since I wrote anything that could be called political in the colloquial sense. I like writing political posts, because I like it when everyone gets mad at me, calls me fat and tells me to go to confession. The last time I wrote about something political, an old woman from who runs a Catholic gift shop called me Pissulo. It was endearing. The last time she attacked me she called me “Stundad” and... Read more
 I don’t know what they were thinking. All I do all day is prattle about my opinions, and I’ve honestly made my opinions about Franciscan University crystal clear by this time. I didn’t like my time there. It was awful for many reasons, some of which weren’t even the University’s fault. But I like taking surveys. I bought an eshakti dress with my tax return and a big first-time buyer discount, and now they send me product surveys all... Read more
 It seems like everyone is up in arms about “The Transformed Wife.” For those of you who don’t know, The Transformed Wife is Lori Alexander, some kind of allegedly Christian blogger I at first thought was a brilliant parody troll but it turns out she’s serious. She wrote a blog post entitled “Men Prefer Debt-Free Virgins Without Tattoos,” illustrated with a nice stock photo of some modest, wholesome blonde woman sitting in a field of dead grass. The article... Read more
 Straws. There are about a thousand big news stories that we need to talk about today and I’m working my way through them as fast as I can, but let me take a minute to talk about straws. Everyone I know on Facebook is angry about straws. It seems that Starbucks has decided to get rid of straws in order to save the environment, or at least look like they’re trying. Instead of straws, their beverages will now have... Read more
 The bus was ten minutes late. I knew what that meant. It meant that I ought to abandon my mission and go home defeated. But we were out of pencils for Rose’s homeschooling, and she wanted craft sticks for a birdhouse, and there was a sale on fresh peaches. I had to go to Wal Mart. I waited in the blazing sun until the bus pulled up with the driver I’ll call Betsy at the wheel. Betsy comes from... Read more
I’ll be back on in about an hour with a real blog post; this post is your periodic reminder that Steel Magnificat, and the Pezzulo family, are almost entirely run on gratuities. I work from home as a writer due to my chronic illness, churning out three to seven literary art projects per week here, and my husband is the homemaker who takes care of Rosie since I’m so often down for the count. I get a very small monthly... Read more
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