This was my very first thought the other morning just before the alarm went off:<\/p>\n
If you spell devil backwards, it’s lived<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Then the alarm went off and scared the devil right out of me like it always does. Why is it that it is always such a shock? I’m usually waiting for it.<\/p>\n
Here’s the thing, though. I don’t believe in the devil. I don’t know that I even believe in evil as anything but a construct to explain particularly awful human behavior. Which there is plenty of. Clearly no one wants to think that we HUMANS are causing all of this misery and destruction. It must be someone else’s fault. Something else’s fault…what if there was a Big Bad who was responsible for all of it? That would be AWESOME. In a very bad way. STILL. A scapegoat for evil–what’s not to like?<\/p>\n
So poof! Then there was a devil. Or devils, depending on your own particular spin on things.<\/p>\n
And then the devil made me stay up late singing with Paddy, and chatting with the Doctor about online dating. So I couldn’t finish writing anything coherent about humans creating a devil and pinning the blame on it for everything that goes wrong. <\/p>\n
Pity. It probably would have been interesting. It was a good idea. <\/p>\n
Did the devil really make me do it? Nah. No such thing. <\/p>\n
I just like singing with Paddy and chatting with Ky-ul.
\nNo devils needed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This was my very first thought the other morning just before the alarm went off: If you spell devil backwards, it’s lived Then the alarm went off and scared the devil right out of me like it always does. Why is it that it is always such a shock? I’m usually waiting for it. Here’s … Continue reading The devil in me<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8959,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9256","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-words"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/michellejolin.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/IMG_2470-0.jpg?fit=341%2C391&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7lr3R-2pi","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":11062,"url":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?p=11062","url_meta":{"origin":9256,"position":0},"title":"What do I want, anyway?","author":"Michelle","date":"February 13, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Be careful what you wish for, lest it come true. --Anon The devil is in the details. --Everyone I'll tell you what I want, what I really, really want So tell me what you want, what you really, really want --the Spice Girls In this time of personal and professional\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Random thoughts"","block_context":{"text":"Random thoughts","link":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?cat=20"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9065,"url":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?p=9065","url_meta":{"origin":9256,"position":1},"title":"Death, cat pee and ink stains","author":"Michelle","date":"January 21, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"\"Not only are there no happy endings,\" she told him, \"there aren't even any endings.\" --Neil Gaiman The notice that the divorce was final came in the mail on the same day she faxed in the paperwork to have her father cremated. There were technical difficulties, and she got ink\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Words"","block_context":{"text":"Words","link":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?cat=7"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5236,"url":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?p=5236","url_meta":{"origin":9256,"position":2},"title":"Who do you love? What do you love? Why am I so full of questions? Are there answers?","author":"Michelle","date":"April 25, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Only what is that thing? Why am I made the way I am? Why do I care about all the wrong things, and nothing at all for the right ones? Or, to tip it another way: how can I see so clearly that everything I love or care about is\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Words"","block_context":{"text":"Words","link":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?cat=7"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/michellejolin.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/20140415-193331.jpg?fit=263%2C300&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":9325,"url":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?p=9325","url_meta":{"origin":9256,"position":3},"title":"Online dating, the plus side","author":"Michelle","date":"February 19, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Just because you feel, hollow inside it's real I'm gonna put something in you Make the devil feel surprised --Mazzy Star\/All Your Sisters If someone has filled out their online dating profile in their own words and answered a representative sample of the entertainingly intrusive questions you can get a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Words"","block_context":{"text":"Words","link":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?cat=7"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/michellejolin.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/IMG_2470-0.jpg?fit=341%2C391&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":359,"url":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?p=359","url_meta":{"origin":9256,"position":4},"title":"Note To Self: Breathing Is Mandatory","author":"Michelle","date":"July 16, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm still alive but I'm barely breathing Just praying to a God that I don't believe in --the Script \u00a0 The barely breathing is my own damn fault, but it's kind of a flawed design in my opinion. It's easy enough to breath IN, but nothing really prompts you to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Words"","block_context":{"text":"Words","link":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?cat=7"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8485,"url":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?p=8485","url_meta":{"origin":9256,"position":5},"title":"What is real?","author":"Michelle","date":"December 8, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"\u201cDoes it happen all at once, like being wound up,\u201d he asked, \u201cor bit by bit?\u201d \u201cIt doesn\u2019t happen all at once,\u201d said the Skin Horse. \u201cYou become. It takes a long time. That\u2019s why it doesn\u2019t often happen to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Words"","block_context":{"text":"Words","link":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?cat=7"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9256","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9256"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9256\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8959"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9256"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9256"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9256"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}