How much better of a world? I’d be happy with half of what I have if it meant literally everyone else in the world could have that much, certainly. Move 4 more people into the house and give up half the money, half the clothes, my car, of course I would do that if it brought the same level of wealth to every single person, it would be not great at first but wow can you imagine how fast it would get better, if nobody was terribly poor? I’d bet that by the time I was old we’d personally be better off than before the split.
No, my kids are certainly diverse in sexual preference and one is transgender, but I didn’t have any sort of unacceptance. I grew up around drag queens and “theater people”.
Maybe in the other direction, honestly - I didn’t see the trans one until they literally came out by telling me, my conception of womanhood is so broad that my kid looking like a 40 year old butch lesbian did not ping any trans radar so I was surprised when they said they wanted to be a man. Not mad or anything but it took awhile to process.
Nobody else has had to “come out” or worry about the race or sex of who they are with, they can bring home whoever they are going out with and we don’t blink, it’s fine.
Cook red lentils with collard greens, mustard greens, or kale, seasoned how you like. Grill sourdough on one side in butter on the cast iron; pour lentil stew over the bread on the untoasted side, eat with all the utensils, knife, spoon, and fork or chopsticks. Yum yum.
Or simple cheese toast if not feeling like cooking. Toast bread, add cheese, broil till melted.
Hmm.
Honestly John Rys Davies, based solely on Dominic Monaghan’s description of him ordering dinner when filming Lord of the Rings.
"John Rhys-Davies… took us to a restaurant. And it was when we’d only just started to get to know John. And we sat down at this huge, long table, and he said, “I think I will order the food for tonight.” And we said, “Oh, ok, on you go John.” And you know, we were having a conversation, and the waitress came over, and John ordered food that would probably have fed 35, maybe 40 people. And there were about 12 of us. And he just said, “We’ll have nine lobster and 15 shrimp, and 12 red snapper, 15 filet mignons, and some grilled mushrooms. I’ll have 12 onions and a wild boar…” You know? All this kind of stuff - just like, “Pheasants, and grouse, and - do you have partridge? Bring the partridge.”
Standing on the side of a road (a real road here in town) with a group, waiting for a bus, when the ground underneath us starts to rise - it’s not the ground, it’s a giant spider! And as it emerges and starts lumbering down the road we realize it is also our transportation, the bus stop was the bus.
I think that was the weirdest moment I have experienced.
I learned to be cool in hot temperature by being still, in the shade, with a breeze, it’s very hot and humid here but also windy usually.
Trees help so much. It is noticeably cooler at the park than in the city.
In the house when there is not air conditioning, roofed porches and opening the windows with fans pulling air through the house helps.
This does sound like she has depression, and needs to address that before working on the relationship.
If it was not so obvious, I would have said she’s checked out of the relationship, but reading the whole post, I don’t think that’s it, it’s more like she’s just checked out of life in general, so I will hope she gets help and finds her energy and libido and joy again.
Then they can work out a schedule to balance the effort. Some of our “rules” are:
If I cook and you eat, you clean, and vice versa.
We make the bed together.
If the toilet paper runs out replace it!
If the dogs or cats need water, fill it!
Outdoors I do everything (garden, weeding, flowerbeds out front) except mowing and edging, husband does those.
I make all design decisions for the house because I have a better eye, husband makes all vacation plans because he’s good at that.
I’m sure there’s a million ways to set things up to leverage individual strengths and talents and still be balanced enough but none will work without commitment from both people, you do have to want it.
A few things help me.
Short commute, so no extra time spent getting to and from the office, and an electric bike that I enjoy commuting on.
Coffee and breakfast at my desk at work, not before going in.
Help at home - husband cleans after supper, and we have a biweekly cleaning lady so I’m not spending all weekend just catching up, can have at least a day to actually relax.
The people I work with are amazing, I like them so much and they like me and each other, it’s a good group.
Taking all my PTO. I do a lot of Fridays off, and usually one solid week off at some point but using them to make short weeks/long weekends feels best to me.
If you really can’t adjust maybe ask about doing the 40 as 4x 10hours not 5x 8?
Do you eat meat? Big hunk o’ pork is one of the favorite meals of my kids. Salt the meat then broil or sear it in a pan. Put it in the slow cooker. Use broth, water, or wine to deglaze the pan and pour that over the meat.
Cut a couple of garlic heads in half horizontally, you don’t have to peel them. Toss them in.
Pour in the rest of the bottle of wine or box of broth, some orange juice is good too, lime if you didn’t have wine. Or some vinegar works if you don’t have lime. If you have cilantro put the stems in, if you don’t, don’t worry about it.
Close and cook on low all day. We usually have it with rice and black beans the first day, it’s good in tortillas with salsa, good on nachos, good in enchiladas, it’s just good
Magnesium L-Threonate was the migraine trigger. Supposed to help prevent them, but did the exact opposite. I do actually use a very small amount of “calcium and magnesium citrate with vitamin D3” as part of a bladder health mix I made with mostly D-Mannose. No problem with that one.
But I’m still not convinced on adding it to water, they’d buy some crappy industrial byproduct most likely if adding it
I think sort of, yes. It’s funny because I will move somewhere, then it gets gentrified and people can’t afford to move there, it’s happened four times in my life. But doesn’t that mean I am an early stage gentrifier, when I move where I can afford to?
And on energy, I feel stuck, need a car, don’t use it often, with two large and two small salaries in the household we are solidly middle class but I don’t want solar panels because then my roof and house become uninsurable, we are all electric no gas.
In short YES anybody living in comfort is likely part of the problem, but I would love for everyone in the world to live in comfort!