Aaron Gies

A Semi-Candidate Statement about running, but not hard

I had worked out a doable plan to collect signatures to be on this year’s ballot, but then the weather defeated the idea. Being a victim of gun violence, the death of Melissa Hortman made me pull back to reassesses safety vulnerabilities for me and my family. I wasn’t far off from restarting my bid when this pointless war crippled my plans due to rising gas prices.

I do want to serve as representative to this weirdly drawn legislative district I grew up in and love. I would fight so hard for her and all the people. In my heart, I know I’d be effective and solve drainage problems among the others plaguing New York District 23rd. I will absolutely serve if I win by a miraculous write-in vote, but at this time I have decided to take a dedicated run off the table for now. I guess I support Gies…I guess.

That truly made me sad to type those two paragraphs.

Here it is, Wednesday, a whole day before the end of the month and if you’re wondering what exciting things I’ve been up to, it’s mostly been filing and putting things away. I even succeeded in getting two boxes of donations into my car AND a trash bag of broken, threadbare, and or unsuitable for donation items got tossed in the bin.

I cannot stress how downright delightful it is to walk into the mud room now, with all those things sorted and put away. It is still crowded and will be until we take out the firewood shelf in the other room and do another round of seasonal furniture adjustment, but it’s such an “ah” to walk in there now. If I can keep the cats out, I even have the chance to stretch out and quietly read for a bit.

I would be done with Isabel Allende’s book by now if I didn’t have to slog through a stupid war in the book whilst living with the nightmare of our service people stuck on the ocean and having food rationed. The stories that are peeping through are brutal. Only 13 dead the so-called president exclaims…maybe 13 in the first few minutes. Who knows the current, true count? I never would have voted for this; I would be gathering other members and working to write legislation to end it.

C’est la vie. Save the Cat is being perused. I’m not keen on writing the story that popped into my head as outrageous enough to actually work. I’m not keen on going through the novel writing process anymore. It’s long and brutal and if I don’t enjoy driving with one headlight, I certainly don’t want to write that way…which is why novel writing book is out. I’m thinking of becoming a plotter.

I’ve not committed to anything. The joy I have in the kitchen is nothing compared to hearing happy people thanking me for the delicious cookies I made…but even if I did start a bakery, I know that payoff wouldn’t be enough with the money to sustain me. I’d lose the joy, and without the joy, the sweets are average and average is a couple bucks on the grocery shelf which already exists, so why bother, you know? I am considering a swap with a local restaurant though, a cheesecake delivered on Thursday for two fish fry dinners on Friday sort of thing. If you’re in the Springville-Boston area, let me know.

Ha! Why not put lovely thoughts out into the universe? Much better than letting incompetent Epsteinaires blow up rockets, especially when Artemis II shows how you do it with grace and style – by listening to women and working respectfully alongside them.

The trillium is in bloom! Enjoy the spring and thank you for stopping by for the read! I appreciate it and I appreciate you!

So What If Not Everyone Likes You?

In a fit of whimsy, I donned a safety orange knit hat and made my way up the hill on the moss strewn steps to talk to the trees and stare at the moon. It was a “I can’t believe the idiot started World War three, but here we go,” morning and I needed some grounding.

We went to a place and found out Springville will be having its own No Kings Day visibility protest on March 28 from 1-3 – which is so smart, as the one in Buffalo is from 11-1, so technically a person could attend both. Afterwards, we ran errands and then dined locally before heading home.

What irritates me is that the same place is endorsing Alison Duwe for office. Someone said they heard the opposition to her last time was that if she won, every roof in town would have a garden on it or some such. That would imply she cared about anything but herself.

People are forgetting how she cost this school district at least an extra 30 thousand dollars for the extra elections that she had to have, trying to push through a gigantic sports complex. She hired an architect and had blueprints made before doing the necessary population study – which showed then a child population decline and still does. She was urged multiple times by me and others in the committee to at least give the voters – WHO FRONT THE BILL FOR THESE PROJECTS – the option of a smaller renovation on the first ballot, but no.

When the vote failed in historic proportions, she changed the voting location from the ground level entry high school library and moved it to a space in the school with constant student traffic, steep stairs to climb, and the wheel chair ramp that I noticed four people struggling to get up in the time it took for me to vote.

When I brought that obstruction to voting to the attention of the board, Allison dismissed it. She didn’t care. She lost and she wanted to punish the people who didn’t vote for her “vision.” She has shown herself to be myopic, petty, and mean. God help the village if you give her any local government control.

I get it, all women are supposed to stick up for each other, She and her husband(?) are of the “do it now, ask forgiveness” later mentality. The system they put in at the Arts Center is pulling water out of the aquifer and dumping it, instead of being a closed-water system that they had nudge nudge wink winked the town into approving.

If we’re all going to possibly die soon because a sick pedophile is intent on distracting the world from his crimes against children, and I have had to listen twice now to a person describe Duwe as some sort of good option, I get to speak my truth because all politics is local and all elections are consequential. I wish I could hold my nose and say, go ahead, put blue leaning women in power everywhere, but not her.

I’ll be looking into the candidacy of Aaron Gies, but if I don’t think he’s strong enough, I will be running myself for that office and in my own way. So…if it gets that far and my campaign is hit with her mob of minions telling everyone what an opinionated beetch I am, always caring too much about cost overruns and handicap people having access and taxing the rich over the poors and equality for all – as well as truth and justice, well, at least I’ll learn if she hate-reads my page looking for her name, so that will be a fun little nugget to admire, won’t it?

And with that out of my system, how are you? Are you in need of grounding, too? What about reading? Have you found it hard to follow books? It took far longer than I anticipated, but I finished one, so hurray, one down for the year. I’m nearly done with another so the bare minimum of a book a month goal is still within reach. Not that I haven’t been reading.

The Writing Club is going as they do. Two of the women are stitching together such amazing work, both of them through historical events, one linear, one with a braid. I can’t wait for them to be books. I have more reading and critiquing to do before the next one, so those are my Sunday plans. My friend Rina is struggling through the last chapters of her father’s book which I’ve also been reading here and there so that’s three books that I can add to tally – when they finish them so I can finish them. Hint, hint, to all of you if you’re reading!

Glee is being binged. I didn’t see it when it ran, or if I did, it was too much. It still is, but in small doses, it’s fine. Knowing what happened though, the first season has lines coming out of Finn’s mouth that make me go “oof.” I watched Sinners for the first of many times. As a film, it is superb. Lighting, casting, costumes, all of it is stunning. I am more selective about screen time in general, but eh, sometimes staring at a screen is all I can do, especially in winter. We’ve had some melt which has improved my mood some knowing spring might arrive any month now.    

I hope you are coping. I send you light and love and honesty. From what I’ve seen of the Epstein files, my heart breaks and I have to walk outside and climb the moss strewn steps and ask the trees what’s going on. What a friggin time to be alive.   

May the drones stay away from you and the collective howls of pain be loud enough to shake the morons in charge into not being such horrible human beings. Thank you for stopping by and for the read. Cheers!