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David McElroy

An Alien Sent to Observe the Human Race

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I didn’t realize this until tonight, but I have been needing to cry

By David McElroy · January 3, 2021

A movie made me cry tonight.

It wasn’t the out-and-out sobbing sort. It was just the kind when tears well up in your eyes and your chest shudders a little. Mostly, it was the sort of experience that made my heart feel full, as though some sort of emotion inside was overflowing.

It’s not a great movie, but I enjoyed it. It’s certainly not a serious film. It just pushed my buttons in emotional ways. It made me feel things I’d been trying not to feel. And I realized afterward that I’ve been needing that. It felt like a release of pent-up feelings.

The movie is a 2005 romantic comedy called “Just Like Heaven.” Reese Witherspoon stars as a hyper-successful physician who doesn’t allow herself time for a personal life. After Elizabeth leaves her hospital — following a 26-hour shift — she has a traffic accident that leaves her in a coma. Close to death.

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Social media is an addictive drug, so I’m kicking my Facebook habit

By David McElroy · December 31, 2020

After 12 or 13 years as a heavy Facebook user, today is my last day posting on my account there. I have mixed feelings about this.

Facebook is addictive by design. A lot of very smart people work hard to design the platform in such a way that users spend more and more time there. The more time a user spends on the platform, the more money Facebook makes.

Companies design their products in ways that suit their own needs, so I don’t blame Facebook. The people there aren’t evil. They simply have incentives to get me to do things which I have decided aren’t healthy for me.

Social media has been a good thing for me in some respects. It’s allowed me to connect or reconnect with people who wouldn’t have been in my life otherwise. I’ve made friends because of Facebook. The platform enabled me to reconnect with a woman who I then fell in love with as a result. And it’s maintained ties with people I might have lost touch with otherwise.

But those positives come at too great a cost. I believe it’s dangerous for all of us, but I’m especially convinced that it’s unhealthy for me.

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In the old Ginger or Mary Ann debate, I wanted a third choice

By David McElroy · December 30, 2020

Actress Dawn Wells’ death today at the age of 82 brought back memories of the old debate from my childhood. Do you prefer Ginger or Mary Ann?

Gilligan’s Island was a ridiculous sitcom that many of us loved anyway. The show was old enough that I grew up seeing it in late-afternoon syndication. My sisters and I often watched it every day after school.

At some point, most people who watched the show took up the question of which of the two young single women in the cast was more desirable. Ginger was the glamorous movie star who had a huge ego. Mary Ann was the small-down girl from the Midwest who was the quintessential “girl next door.”

If you were a man, your choice said something about the sort of woman who appealed to you. If you were a woman, your choice said something about who you really wanted to be.

I felt a little lost in such debates — because I didn’t think either of them represented my ideal woman.

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It’s 27 degrees in Birmingham after midnight, bu It’s 27 degrees in Birmingham after midnight, but the thick fog covering my neighborhood right now makes it feel magical enough to ignore the miserable cold for a few minutes. #nature #naturephotography #fog #trees #night #birmingham #alabama
As I was getting into the car after work just afte As I was getting into the car after work just after 5 p.m., I looked up and saw this beautiful full moon shining through the bare limbs of a nearby tree. #nature #naturephotography #tree #moon #birmingham #alabama
Here are the top nine photos I’ve posted on this Here are the top nine photos I’ve posted on this account in 2020, as determined by your “likes.” #topnine
It’s very foggy in my neighborhood as Lucy and I It’s very foggy in my neighborhood as Lucy and I take our walk late Saturday night. #nature #naturephotography #fog #trees #night #birmingham #alabama
The moonlight is bright and widely diffused in the The moonlight is bright and widely diffused in the heavy fog in my neighborhood tonight. #moonlight #trees #night #birmingham #alabama
This was the Birmingham sunset just a few minutes This was the Birmingham sunset just a few minutes before 5 p.m. Wednesday. #nature #naturephotography #sky #colorful #clouds #sunset #birmingham #alabama
I just remembered a photo I took as I walked out o I just remembered a photo I took as I walked out of my front door at lunch to come back to the office. As you can see, we still have quite a few leaves on most of our trees. #nature #naturephotography #sky #tree #autumn #birmingham #alabama
As I was coming back from the bank just a moment a As I was coming back from the bank just a moment ago, I saw some lovely color along Shades Crest Road in the Bluff Park neighborhood. #nature #naturephotography #sky #colorful #clouds #sunset #birmingham #alabama
It’s wonderfully foggy in my neighborhood tonigh It’s wonderfully foggy in my neighborhood tonight, so it feels a bit like walking through a magical fairyland. #fog #birmingham #alabama
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It’s 4 in the morning, but Merlin is still awake It’s 4 in the morning, but Merlin is still awake with me in the bedroom to keep my company. Everybody else has given up and gone to sleep. #cat #cats #catstagram #catsofinstagram #cute #cutecat #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #merlin2024 #instacat #ilovecats #birmingham #alabama #caturday
Molly is still healing under her left eye from the Molly is still healing under her left eye from the place where she scratched herself when he had an eye infection about 10 or 12 days ago. You can barely see a thin red line where she scratched herself. #cat #cats #catstagram #catsofinstagram #cute #cutecat #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #greeneyes #instacat #ilovecats #birmingham #alabama #caturdayeve
Like a little feline scientist, Thomas studies the Like a little feline scientist, Thomas studies the strange human in front of him. He still isn’t certain that his ancestors should have allowed Homo sapiens to survive. #cat #cats #catstagram #catsofinstagram #cute #cutecat #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #tabby #tabbycat #instacat #ilovecats #birmingham #alabama
Merlin is never thrilled about being picked up, bu Merlin is never thrilled about being picked up, but especially for a photo with me. He seems to think it’s undignified. #cat #cats #catstagram #catsofinstagram #cute #cutecat #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #merlin2024 #instacat #ilovecats #birmingham #alabama
Lucy’s watching the Alabama-Ohio State game with Lucy’s watching the Alabama-Ohio State game with me tonight, so she has her game face on. She’s excited that Alabama is ahead by 21 points, but she stays nervous until the fourth quarter is almost over. #dog #dogs #dogstagram #dogsofinstagram #cute #cutedog #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #instadog #ilovedogs #birmingham #alabama
Thomas just woke up from a nap and he’ll be asle Thomas just woke up from a nap and he’ll be asleep again just as quickly as the camera leaves him alone. #cat #cats #catstagram #catsofinstagram #cute #cutecat #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #tabby #tabbycat #instacat #ilovecats #birmingham #alabama
Hours after her actual dinner, Molly sits at her b Hours after her actual dinner, Molly sits at her bowl, apparently waiting for “second dinner” to arrive. On the left side of her face, you can see where she hurt herself with her claws one day last week while she had an eye infection. The infection is gone and the claw mark is healing, too. #cat #cats #catstagram #catsofinstagram #cute #cutecat #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #greeneyes #instacat #ilovecats #birmingham #alabama
Even when it’s 32 degrees outside, Lucy is eager Even when it’s 32 degrees outside, Lucy is eager to get out there for a walk. Of course, she’s also eager to get back into the house after just a few minutes. #dog #dogs #dogstagram #dogsofinstagram #cute #cutedog #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #instadog #ilovedogs #birmingham #alabama
Merlin almost always looks like a wise old man who Merlin almost always looks like a wise old man who could teach you a lot about life if you could read his mind. #cat #cats #catstagram #catsofinstagram #cute #cutecat #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #merlin2024 #instacat #ilovecats #birmingham #alabama #caturdayeve
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I’ve never been attracted to skinny women. There’s nothing wrong with someone who’s naturally thin, but it’s never been my preference. What has shocked me, though, is the judgment I’ve heard from women all through my life — about themselves and others — about who’s “fat.” I concluded long ago that most women in our culture have been brainwashed to believe that skinny is attractive — and that anything other than skinny is ugly. I first assumed that I was the oddball — for preferring women with bigger and heavier bodies — but I’m coming to the conclusion that most men naturally feel this way to one extent or another. I just ran across new research by a couple of Northwestern University psychology professors that shows that women seriously overestimate how much a straight man will be attracted to a skinny woman. In a perfect world, we would all be at a healthy weight, but when it comes to attractiveness, too heavy is more attractive than skinny. At least to me — and to a lot of men, too.

Years ago, I heard a question that seemed very insightful at the time. You’ve probably heard it, too. What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail? The question is intended to help you uncover things you really want to do, but which you’re afraid to try — for fear of failure. In an interview today, I heard the great marketing guru Seth Godin give a different point of view. He said the better question is to ask what you would do even if you knew it would fail. That struck me as far more insightful than the original version. We ought to be doing what we know is right, not what will maximize our success or praise from others. There are some battles that are worth fighting even if you believe you’re doomed to failure. Those battles are often for love or important ideas or our children. Some things are simply worth fighting for — and the truth is that you might win anyway. Do the right thing. Take the chance.

The more I understand about myself, about human nature and about the nature of reality, the more I realize I’m a radical by the standards of both Modernism and Postmodernism. Seeing the things which I’m stumbling toward makes me an enemy of many of the core ideas upon which contemporary culture is built. It exposes the culture as a monstrous lie — like a dangerous infection that’s slowly destroying what human were created to be. My “inner observer” has always known that truth was found in the ideas of the Enlightenment, but I’m slowly finding words to explain what has merely been instinct until now. The Enlightenment was humanity’s great leap forward, but shallow and arrogant thinkers for the next two centuries threw away the fruits of that achievement. We can’t go forward as a species until we go back to correct this intellectual and spiritual error — and part of that is acknowledging that our collective attempts to do away with our Creator will always fail.

I’ve come to believe that some of us — including me — aren’t very good at knowing how to be happy. I don’t mean that in the sense that happy talk and positive thinking should be able to make us happy regardless of the circumstances. I mean that some of us had so much experience with being unhappy when we were young that we were trained to be unhappy — and that being happy is an unconsciously uncomfortable thing. When I look at times in my past when I should have been happy, it rarely lasted. I believe now that I found reasons to be unhappy — and caused real problems for myself — because being comfortable and happy felt so foreign to my programming. If I’m right, this means that some of us have to do more than just change our circumstances. It means we have to learn how to accept the happiness that we unconsciously fear we don’t deserve.

After I wrote last night about being happy, I thought of an old song that mirrored what I was feeling. After listening to the entire album, I found it remarkable how well the emotions of that music match my own heart at this point in my life. Bob Bennett’s “Matters of the Heart” came out while I was in college. Even after all these years, it holds up really well, and you can listen to the entire album on YouTube. The specific song which matched my feelings last night was “Madness Dancing,” but I still find every song on the album to be strong with the exception of the eighth and ninth. (The song about his parents, called “1951,” is especially poignant.) In fact, the opening and closing songs paint a picture of my heart at its best now in these lines: “A light shining in this heart of darkness, A new beginning and a miracle, Day by day the integration of the concrete and the spiritual.” It’s old music that you’ve probably never heard, but it means a lot to me.

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