abuse in caregiving professions (like teaching or nursing) is not solely a result of power dynamics. it's also because people who go into those professions tend to have a idea of themselves as Good People. recognising or acknowledging their own capacity for harm contradicts that idea. so they mentally put 'people who have inconvenienced me' into the 'Bad People' box (which conveniently doubles up as the 'People I Am Allowed to Hurt' box), and just like that, the world is made simple again.

i read ross greene a lot when i was working with 'difficult' or 'behaviourally challenged' children. his refrain is kids do well if they can - meaning, in short, that most kids act out only when the demands of a situation exceed their capabilities. punishing them for this is not only cruel but also completely pointless, because they also don't want to be doing what they are doing.

📷 Nguyễn Trọng Quyết

Arizona Society

The moment you know your day is about to go sideways in Arizona is when you spot a javelina standing somewhere it absolutely shouldn’t be.

Not in the desert.

Not out in the brush.

Right in the middle of your driveway like it owns the deed.

In Arizona, this isn’t an animal.

This is a desert tank with attitude and zero fear.

You slow down, hoping it’ll move. It doesn’t.

You tap your horn gently. It ignores you.

You inch the car forward. It takes one slow step toward you like, “Go ahead. Try me.”

You consider calling in late to work. Suddenly your schedule feels flexible.

The javelina just stands there. Silent. Still. Calculating.

Like it knows you pay property taxes and it does not — yet somehow you’re the guest.

And then it happens — the warning signs.

That stiff body posture.

The slow turn of the head.

The “I might charge just because I can” energy.

That’s when you understand: you’re not backing out anymore. You’re in a standoff. A javelina has decided this is its territory, and you are a minor inconvenience.

Tourists think Arizona wildlife means rattlesnakes.

Locals know better.

Snakes usually mind their business.

Coyotes keep moving.

But a javelina will square up with you in your own driveway like you owe it money.

They don’t rush at you like an animal.

They walk.

Confident.

Unbothered.

Powered by pure audacity and zero consequences.

So you do what every Arizonan does in this situation:

You put the car in park.

You wait it out.

You accept that you are not the apex species in this neighborhood.

Because the truth is simple:

In Arizona,

the javelina doesn’t move for you.

Gradient of flowers from my California native plant garden:

Sulphur Buckwheat (Eriogonum umbellatum)

Desert Marigold (Baileya multiradiata)

Five-Needled Thymophylla (Thymophylla pentachaeta var. belenidium)

Western Columbine (Aquilegia formosa)

Purple Haze Aster (Symphyotrichum chilense)

Foothill Penstemon (Penstemon Heterophyllus)

Western Blue Flax (Linum lewisii)

past limbo; angeles national forest, california

2026 June 29

M82: Galaxy with a Supergalactic Wind Image Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, A. Smercina (STScI, Tufts), T. Williams (U. Manchester); Image Processing: A. Pagan (STScI)

Explanation: Why is the Cigar Galaxy billowing red smoke? M82, as this starburst galaxy is also known, was stirred up by a recent pass near large spiral galaxy M81. This doesn’t fully explain the source of the red-glowing outwardly expanding gas and dust, however. Evidence indicates that this gas and dust is being driven out by the combined emerging particle winds of many stars, together creating a galactic superwind. The dust particles are thought to originate in M82’s interstellar medium and are actually similar in size to particles in cigar smoke. The featured photographic mosaic combines images taken in visible light from the Hubble Space Telescope and images taken in infrared light from James Webb Space Telescope. It shows the light-colored central galaxy nearly edge on across the image center with tremendous orange and red colored filaments of gas and dust extending both up and down. The filaments extend for over 10,000 light years. The 12-million light-year distant Cigar Galaxy is the brightest galaxy in the sky in infrared light and can be seen in visible light with a small telescope towards the constellation of the Great Bear (Ursa Major).