Rants

No More Comforting Lies

February 2, 2026 by RasmeniaNo Comments

Two decades. That’s what I celebrated on New Year’s Day. Twenty years since I boarded a plane in Denver to start a new life in Paris. So many things have come and gone during that time. Lessons. Loss. Lifetimes.A few days after toasting that anniversary, I buttoned up my black suit over my very fancy Joe Strummer t-shirt and threw on my very classy black Converse All Stars. Then my husband and I attended a ceremony at the town hall here in Brighton where we became British citizens.Not where I envisaged things going when I moved to France in 2006, but many things that are part of daily life were unimaginable twenty years ago. I’ve been visiting that point in time a lot recently. Temporal landmarks provoke reflection. A brief regression to who and where we were. It’s not nostalgia, exactly. Just a side effect of crossing a milestone.I’ll be honest. I experienced severe growing pains during the first few...

That Shiny Newfangled Technology Can’t Do the Work for You

July 3, 2023August 29, 2024 by RasmeniaNo Comments

The venue reeks of cheap coffee. Creaks and groans of tables and chairs dragging on the hardwood floor echo, bouncing off the high ceiling. Barely audible beneath it all is the mumbling of socially awkward writers mingling in the early morning.The chipped folding tables are covered with cloths. Stacks of books and displays are propped up, tip over, then propped up again. Chatter and laughter rise in volume proportional to the increasing number of bodies.A quiet little man with a single stack of books stands next to his wife, who looks at no one and speaks to no one. He shows me his book. Shows me photos of himself with his book. Tells me how impressed people are with his work. And so on.This guy, my neighbor for the day, nods toward my carefully laid-out display of books. My short story trilogy, finally complete.“How long did these take you to write?”The way he asks this, it feels like a trick...

Here’s a Story About How to Stop Eating Bullshit

March 1, 2017March 1, 2017 by Rasmenia Comment Closed

Passports are amazing. In 1998, when I received my first passport, it was as though I had a golden ticket that could take me anywhere. I flipped through the pages, dreaming of all the stamps that would one day fill this little blue-covered book. I was an insecure twenty-something who graduated from high school two years late and had just been fired from my low-paying factory job. People like me didn't travel. People like me only visited far away places in books and movie screens. That's what I believed. So, it was funny that I had a round-trip ticket to London, a packed bag, and a Let's Go! guide to Britain under my arm.Other countries were an intimidating and weird magic. I wanted to experience that.During that adventure, I explored various parts of England and Scotland. I took the Eurostar to Paris. I rode the métro. I made an ass of myself. I talked with strangers, got lost, rained on,...

When it Comes to Marriage, Love Beats Tradition

April 17, 2014June 27, 2015 by Rasmenia Comment Closed

I've been getting invited to more weddings lately. About a year ago, France legalized same-sex marriage. They didn't stop there - gay and lesbian couples now have the right to adopt children, too. That's something I'm profoundly grateful for.Oh, not because I'm gay or want to adopt a child, but because I'm not an asshole.Also, because I like to see my friends happy and endowed with equal rights. I like to see human beings treated as such and to see children who need homes and love being taken in by people who want to give them those things.While I think it's naive to believe that 'All You Need is Love,' I do still like to see love win.'Traditional marriage' isn't real. It's not a thing. It's a phrase that usually represents outdated thinking and the meaning of it gets skewed in whatever way the speaker decides to twist it.Whenever someone tries to throw an argument at me about how traditional...

The Airplane Personality Test

March 14, 2013 by Rasmenia Comment Closed

I hate flying. When I was a kid, I traveled by plane often, as many children of divorced parents do. Back then, it was a fun & exciting adventure. Because I was a wee one traveling alone, I received special attention. The flight attendant would bring me a little plastic pin with wings on it. "A gift from the captain," they'd say.I'd read my books & listen to my Walkman. The person sitting next to me was always nice. Or, at least quiet & polite.Over time, things changed. I got bigger. My legs grew longer. My patience, shorter.I take more international flights now. The airlines have changed, too. Now there's a lot more seats crammed into a single airplane in order to squeeze more money out of every flight.Flying anywhere -- even a 2 or 3-hour flight -- has become a fucking ordeal that one must survive, rather than a fun & exciting adventure. It's no longer the happy beginning...

A Story About Guns

January 18, 2013November 30, 2020 by Rasmenia Comment Closed

When I got my first and last gun, I was in the morning kindergarten class. The bus dropped me off after school and I'd watch TV in the living room while eating my lunch. Old reruns of some of the best shows were on in the afternoon: Batman. The Lone Ranger and The Adventures of Superman. I ate my sandwich with Adam West, George Reeves or Clayton Moore, then I'd run off to read my comic books, or play outside. I had no siblings, so I usually played make believe by myself. Sometimes I suited up in my Wonder Woman gear to save the world. Other times, I became Supergirl, flying around by fastening some sort of cape around my neck and hanging from my swing set. And when I had my little cap gun, I was just as brave and heroic as the Lone Ranger.In my mind, it wasn't symbolic in any way of a thing that hurt people. It...