Banal Hemorrhage

Social anxiety sometimes rears its ugly face even in moments when you are supposed to let go.  One situation that triggers me a lot is with music. You see folks, I was born with no rhythm.  Granted; that's not uncommon, but I was also born Latino . A Latino who can't dance is in the "Latino who doesn't like soccer" levels of social ostracizing. Which reminds me, I don't like soccer either.  People tried. So many patient girls tried to get me to step in beat with the songs. It didn't take. I may be able to keep a beat for a bar or two but my mind wanders and dislodges from any semblance of order. This is a post about social anxiety, not my lack of rhythm, though, so I wanted to talk about a strategy I learned over the years. I talked about booze and drugs in the previous post , but here's my next strategy; a healthy one that will not cut your life short: controlled embarrassment. It's like microdosing social anxiety, inoculating your system a little

  Me and social anxiety are BFFs. We have been tightly wound together since my testicles dropped belatedly (according to my locker room observations) . My anxiety  peaked in high school, in which it took a worrisome spike. Walking through the hallways of that fountain of anxiety we call high school, I remember thinking that I had zits pulsing and oozing and generally Akira-monstering throughout my face and that everyone was staring at me.  Narcissism and social anxiety can sometimes meet in the middle.  They meet in the Venn's Vagina, as I like to call the space between two circles.  I was in the Venn's Vagina during high school. If I recall correctly, the only vagina I was in during high school. My social anxiety got better after high school, but as everything in the mental health realm, it's never totally gone. I'm a recovering nervous Nellie. Or do we guys have nervous Ned? This comic is based on the thoughts that flutter wildly in my head, thoughts I’ve learned to c

The alliance between the GOP and the Libertarian party is one of the strangest things in a country full of strange politics.  A libertarian in the United States in 2023 has two choices to make an impact. Either play with the Democratic party or play with the Republican party. The Democratic party wants the government to be big enough to intercede on behalf of people, with systems like affirmative action, social safety nets, food stamps, Medicare for all. They believe in the freedom to love, marry and bang any consenting adult your heart desires. They want women to have private choices. They trust citizens to make their own choices regarding some drugs. They realize the United States is made of immigrants and they want to improve the pathways to citizenship we have. Read their platform , it's available for all. The Republican party wants the government to be small, but big enough to investigate women's ovulation patterns, disallow people from doing marijuana, build big walls and

Once, a very long time ago, I was in a bar somewhere. Through sheer luck, the vagaries of the night life and stars aligning, I found myself making out with a pretty girl in the bathroom lines. Out of nowhere, a weird but absolutely swole bodyguard type came up to us and said, "Why this guy? Stop it!" He had a face of consternation, like he was completely depressed that people that weren't him were having fun. We left and had a good laugh about the poor guy and how jelly he was. However, maybe he had a point.  Why was a pretty girl making out with me, a noodle-armed, balding, pear-shaped homo sapiens? Wouldn't millions of years of biology favor the bulbous hominid with the muscles? I mean I'm not complaining, but should I be worried about the human race? I never wanted to reproduce, I have no actual rhythm (which counts double against me as a Latino), and I have a mental health gestalt that I would call a wee bit below average. It's a miracle I have attracted a