I’m thinking out loud here.

I don’t know about you, but I find the world rather frightening at the moment.

Ferguson. I have strong feelings about what happened there. I’m not going to share those feelings with you because, no matter what I feel, I still don’t know the whole story. None of us do.

That being said, I am appalled at the level of vitriol about the tragedy that took place there that I see on social media. Once again, some people seem to think hate-filled public discourse is the only path to take. And that anyone who disagrees with them must be called names, labeled a traitor, and dealt with accordingly.

Will we never learn?

ISIS. I am heartsick at their slaughter of innocents, of anyone with different beliefs than theirs. I am horrified at what this group, a more dangerous entity than Al Quaeda, is carrying out in Syria and Iraq.

And now the latest, the horrific beheading of an American journalist. That act certainly brings this battle home, doesn’t it?

I am a pacifist. I am anti-war.

But I find myself saying, “Kill them. Kill them all.” That in itself is shocking to me. But maybe not so shocking, because that reaction is a visceral one, from my core. It’s some sort of primal thing. There can be no reasoning with this group. They are murderous zealots.

But am I then as bad as them?

Oh, I have so much more I could say. About innocent children being shipped back to countries where they will most certainly be in danger and may lose their lives. And, in fact, have. About the conflict in Israel and Gaza that never seems to end, where more innocent lives have been lost and where images of injured and dead children cannot be erased from my memory.

And on and on it goes.

Whatever one’s political leanings, I think we can agree that the loss of innocent lives is a tragedy that should never be labeled as something that is a regretful, but, unfortunately sometimes necessary, by-product of war. I’ve heard it described that way – very recently, in fact.

The wars and murders that have been perpetrated under the guise of ‘religion’ are legion. And it never seems to stop.

I have no answers but I do know this: We cannot lose our fundamental sense of humanity.

And I absolutely know that God, a Higher Power, Allah, Divine Intelligence, whatever name you prefer, is not the creator and/or cheerleader for any of this.

No, indeed.

I’ve been thinking about the word ‘shed’ lately. Not the outbuilding. The verb. As in ‘to discard.’ This is due partly to my being a bit more housebound than usual, which has resulted in my looking around the house and deciding to get rid of some things. Things I simply don’t need and things I’ve grown out of. I was going to say that when you live in a small house anything superfluous really stands out, but I have a feeling that is true of any house, big or small.

I want to gather those objects that I no longer need, that no longer ‘fit’ me, and I don’t just mean clothes, and pass them on. Shed them.

I think that part of what we do as we grow and mature is try on new activities, new hobbies, new clothes, new ‘ideas’ of ourselves. We eagerly embrace the new thing and sometimes it sticks and sometimes it doesn’t. I’ve certainly had that happen with clothes. Some look, some style that I thought was absolutely perfect for me turns out, in the long run, to be completely wrong for the real me. Like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. I’m a jeans and T-shirt kind of girl. That’s me.

It’s probably why people re-decorate. A style that seemed ‘you’ for so long eventually is no longer ‘you.’ It doesn’t fit right. You’ve changed and your look has changed. You shed the old for the new.

If I took the time, I could make a long list of things I embraced that I was absolutely sure were me. And weren’t.

There was a time when I wanted to read all the classics, as well as all the weighty tomes reviewed in the New York Times Book Review every week. I wanted to be thought of as an intellectual. Turns out I like fiction, especially mysteries and thrillers, and the occasional biography. Everything else? Not so much. So, though I consider myself well read, I came to terms with the real me’s reading preferences and I shed an ‘idea’ that didn’t fit.

I’ve tried on a few things since I started blogging simply because I was entranced by the beauty of the crafts I saw others create, or the charming look of the homes I saw every time I clicked onto a new site. I thought I could be a certain kind of crafter. I could make little boxes or charming things from old fabrics and lots of laces and trims. In fact, I did make a few of those things. But eventually, I tired of them because they weren’t really me. They didn’t fit. I’m shedding them.

Likewise with the blog; trying to make it anything other than what it already is in order to bring in more income simply doesn’t fit. It isn’t being true to the real me, the voice behind every post for the last six years. So, as much as I’d like to earn more income, I value the place I have created here on the web far too much to change anything.

Trying out new ideas, new activities, new anything is vital to our growth. I also think that admitting that something no longer fits or feels right is equally vital. Each time I do something like that, I feel I come to know myself more deeply. I accept who I am. It’s freeing.

Are there things, whether ideas or three-dimensional, that you have shed?

Happy Tuesday.