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	<title>FlipCollective</title>
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		<title>The Story of an E-magazine Called Cartel, by Paul Shirley</title>
		<link>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/05/21/the-story-of-an-e-magazine-called-cartel-by-paul-shirley/</link>
		<comments>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/05/21/the-story-of-an-e-magazine-called-cartel-by-paul-shirley/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 21 May 2013 17:29:42 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>pshirley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Books]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Paul Shirley]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[best emagazines]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cartel]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cartel magazine]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[emagazine]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[eric nusbaum]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[paul merrill]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[paul shirley magazine]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[steven hyden]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.flipcollective.com/?p=12032</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[This is my challenge: I need to tell you about the fifth issue of Cartel, the e-magazine I edit, run, and write for. I need to do this quickly, because if I do not do it quickly, your attention will turn to Twitter, a Deadspin article, or the truly dreadful news on your Facebook feed, which is that that girl you hate, Kelsey, got engaged last week. So quick is what I will be. ** The biggest obstacle in convincing people to buy an e-magazine is this one: they don’t want to pay for content they think can get online. And that I understand. I, too, browse the articles my friends send me – on Slate, or Jezebel, or – what’s that one – FlipCollective. I read them, or I skim them, or I give them the same cursory glance I’d give a motorcycle accident. And then I move on. If Cartel were like this, I would assume that no one would ever buy an issue or take out a subscription. But Cartel is not like this. ** Here’s how Cartel works: Step One. I find writers I like, respect and can’t stop reading. I pester these writers with unsolicited emails that express my hope that they will relent when I tell them that, for Cartel, they can A) write about whatever they want and B) expect to make upward of $40 to do so. Step Two. I set up an editing schedule for these writers. What this means is that Steven Hyden, who writes about music for outlets like Grantland.com and Rolling Stone, edits Eric Nusbaum, who writes about sports and travel for Outside and GQ, and who in turn edits Gabe Muoneke, who is a petroleum engineer in Nigeria. Step Three. These writers return to work on their pieces before sending them to me for a final edit. Step Four. The writers send me an audio version of their pieces, which I compile into an &#8220;album.&#8221; Graphic designer Scott Shaffer uses the brilliant photography of Van Ditthavong in the creation of the PDF version of Cartel. Step Five. We, the contributors, attempt to explain why you should buy our work. Step Five-A. You, the reader, buy it. (FINGERS CROSSED!) Step Six. I distribute the earnings to the contributors, equally. ** The point is this: Cartel isn’t like most writing on the internet. It’s better. It’s not better because the people writing on the internet are worse writers than we are. It’s better because those writers are rushed; they have to churn out a piece about the funny face Kristin Stewart made at last night’s awards show because if they wait, no one will care about the funny face Kristin Stewart made at last night’s awards show because Kristin Stewart will already have made a funny face at another awards show tonight. We take our time with Cartel. From start to finish, one issue takes six weeks to produce. I think the result is something you’ll be happy to read (or hear), because the result is an e-magazine full of artfully considered, thoughtful pieces. Pieces like a meditation on The Who, classic rock, and death by Steven Hyden; the careful deconstruction of a trip to Cuba and the romance he encountered there by Eric Nusbaum; the reflection on a month of silence in an LA-bound car by Arianna Schioldager; the telling of the story of a trip through down-and-out Navajo Nation by Peter Harrison; the explanation of all John Hughes’s faults by Paul Merrill; a tale of what Nigeria is really like by Gabe Muoneke; my own discovery about everlasting life – a discovery that requires no belief in ghosts, phantoms, or deities; and hilarious graphics by my brother, Matt Shirley. Here’s what that looks like: And here’s what that sounds like: ** Cartel isn’t a blog. It isn’t immediate. Cartel is thoughtful and careful and old-fashioned. It comes in formats external to the internet (PDF, Kindle, MP3), meant to be downloaded and read or listened to when you have the mental space to appreciate it. It takes time to build, and it takes time to consume. And if that doesn’t sound like your thing, no problem, Uproxx awaits. But if that does sound like your thing, take a look, have a peek, come on inside and give it a read. We’d be glad to have you. ** You can subscribe to Cartel for a year for $15. Or you can subscribe and get a T-shirt for $20 (free shipping). Single issues are $4.99 for visual (PDF, Kindle), $4.99 for audio (MP3), or $5.99 for both. And, hey, if you&#8217;re not into reading, the T-shirts ($15, free shipping) looked pretty damned good, too.]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
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		<item>
		<title>The Next Jason Collins?, by Paul Shirley</title>
		<link>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/05/06/the-next-jason-collins-by-paul-shirley/</link>
		<comments>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/05/06/the-next-jason-collins-by-paul-shirley/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 06 May 2013 16:57:10 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>pshirley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Paul Shirley]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sports]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[jason collins]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[jason collins comes out]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[nba player on jason collins]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[paul shirley on jason collins]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.flipcollective.com/?p=11084</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[This piece appears in the May 6, 2013 edition of the Spanish daily El Pais. You can read the original (Spanish) version here. When the Washington Wizards’ Jason Collins announced that he was gay, I had several thoughts. The first was obvious and has been represented all over the world, in newspapers, Twitter feeds, and television interviews. I thought Collins was brave and wanted to shake his hand. The second was slightly cynical. I wondered if the outpouring of support by fellow athletes, on Twitter and Facebook, was genuine. This because I know locker room culture, and I know that locker room culture is not nearly as progressive as was being reported. The third was completely cynical. I pondered whether the timing of the announcement was important to Collins’s career. At 34 and having just finished his twelfth NBA season, Jason Collins is a terrible NBA basketball player. He averaged all of 1.1 points and 1.6 rebounds for the Wizards this year. Does his announcement make it difficult for any team to consider not signing him? All of these were reasonable thoughts. I am not particularly proud of them, but I am also not particularly ashamed of them. Which is more than I can say about my fourth thought, which was: who else? On its surface, this thought doesn’t seem controversial, or even ugly. It is only natural, some might say, to wonder who else in the NBA might be gay. If there is one, it stands to reason that there might be others. And we are only human, and grounded in a desire for gossip. But here’s the problem with that fourth thought of mine: it isn’t a tolerant thought. The point of the public outpouring of support for Jason Collins’s announcement was that it showed our tolerance of a sexual orientation that is different from the norm. A key component in this tolerance is the recognition that homosexuality isn’t “bad.” Another is that we shouldn’t treat gay people as if their sexual orientation is something we should chart or track down. And this is why that fourth thought of mine is my least favorite. In having it, I was admitting that I was searching for Others. I was trying to determine who was different. This would probably be acceptable if I were a player in an NBA locker room. There are distinct complications found in mixing in locker rooms people who may be sexually attracted to one another. But I am not a player in an NBA locker room. Someone’s sexual orientation has no effect on me, you, or the guy down the street. For us, looking for the next gay player is dangerously close to witch-hunting; it paints homosexuality as something of which we should be mindful, like terrorism or anti-Semitism. Tolerance is the awareness that people are different, without making a big deal out of it – without the desire to find the next Jason Collins. Tolerance means I will think no more about someone’s sexual orientation than I do his eye color, his taste in music, or the peculiarities of his laugh. Tolerance replaces “who’s next?” with “who cares?” And I don’t think we’re there just yet.]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Hiatus!, by The FlipCollective Staff</title>
		<link>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/08/hiatus-by-the-flipcollective-staff-2/</link>
		<comments>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/08/hiatus-by-the-flipcollective-staff-2/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 08 Apr 2013 19:22:46 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>pshirley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[In the News]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Paul Shirley]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[flipcollective]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[flipcollective hiatus]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[writing hiatus]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.flipcollective.com/?p=10730</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[First, a big hug-and-thank-you to everyone who read our work during what we deemed Season Four. We were glad to have you reading, and gladder to be writing. Second, as planned, we won&#8217;t be posting to FlipCollective for the next two months. We&#8217;ll use the time off to search for inspiration, to store up tales of triumph and woe, and to concentrate on other projects. We&#8217;ll be back in early June for Season Five, during which we&#8217;ll try to fill your minds with what we hope are stories that make your day a little better. Third, while we&#8217;re gone, have a look at some of the best of the best from Season Four: &#8220;All Adventurous Women Do&#8221; Amanda Oliver. Original publication date: February 7, 2013. &#8220;Hey Girl. Stop Talking&#8221; Arianna Schioldager. Original publication date: March 21, 2013. &#8220;The United States Bill of Rights (Revised 2/16/13)&#8221; Hank Layton. Original publication date: February 18, 2013. &#8220;A New Breed&#8221; Jenny Bahn. Original publication date: March 27, 2013. &#8220;Polite Insincerity Required&#8221; Jenny McIlroy. Original publication date: January 31, 2013. &#8220;A Collective Love Letter: Remembering Why We Love Who We Love, for the Sake of Equality&#8221; Katie Levisay. Original publication date: April 3, 2013. &#8220;Mr. Basketball&#8221; Luke Bonner. Original publication date: February 28, 2013. &#8220;The United States Is&#8230; How a Search Engine&#8217;s Autocomplete Describes the 50 States&#8221; Matt Shirley. Original publication date: February 4, 2013. &#8220;Surviving Trader Joe&#8217;s&#8221; Paul Shirley. Original publication date: January 29, 2013. &#8220;Finding Seams on Thomson Lake&#8221; Peter Harrison. Original publication date: February 8, 2013. &#8220;The Definitive Guide to the 2013 Brooklyn Indie Rock Scene&#8221; Rob Moreschi. Original publication date: February 1, 2013. &#8220;Cold&#8221; Rosicky Jones. Original publication date: February 19, 2013. &#8220;First Date Questions&#8221; Scott Muska. Original publication date: March 5, 2013. &#8220;Behind the Lyrics, Part I: &#8216;In The Air Tonight&#8217;&#8221; Tom Dinard. Original publication date: January 14, 2013. ** Follow FlipCollective on Twitter. If you enjoyed our work this season, support FlipCollective by subscribing to C A R T E L, which features all-new writing by folks like Neal Pollack, Justin Halpern, and Paul Shirley. (See you in June.)]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>7</slash:comments>
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		<item>
		<title>There Are No Miracles in Oklahoma, by Peter Harrison</title>
		<link>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/05/there-are-no-miracles-in-oklahoma-by-peter-harrison/</link>
		<comments>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/05/there-are-no-miracles-in-oklahoma-by-peter-harrison/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 05 Apr 2013 17:10:42 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>pshirley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Fiction]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Peter Harrison]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bike rides in oklahoma]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bike trips]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[biking]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ride across america]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[soul-searching]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[stories about biking]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.flipcollective.com/?p=10724</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Biking through Oklahoma’s panhandle in July reminded Vic of Swiss cheese. Rising morning temperatures—into the triple digits by 10 a.m.—meant scorched afternoons, and a lingering sizzle in the evenings. Swiss cheese made some sense, primarily because the holes of his life felt larger than ever. And also because the consistency of cheese, under the summer heat of Oklahoma, loses. Fondue wins. So the brain inside Vic’s head would make for a great appetizer dip. Lastly, consider that without a shower in four days, Vic smelled something rank. Like how Swiss cheese would after baking on the Oklahoma blacktop. The stretch of land, between the borders of Northern Texas and Southern Colorado, is America’s oddball. Some say Oklahoma never had its panhandle until Texas retreated away from the wind-swept wasteland. Others contest that Colorado jumped 27 miles northward so as to be known forever as The Rocky Mountain State, and not for its southern ugly windy strip. And everyone agrees that New Mexico is too pretty to have a panhandle. So Oklahoma won out. And it won wind. Nasty, knock-the-sins-off-your-frame kind of wind. So much wind that not even the Natives settled there, for fear that women would suffer miscarriages from the hungry wind during the day, and the howling wind during the night. The wind eats, legend has it, and it feeds off innocence. That was back then. Now the wind feeds off anything, or anyone, that passes through. Vic included. So Vic decided to make the push in a single day. He left Hollywood, Oklahoma, the town whose only bar served him moonshine in a dirty coffee mug, before the sun made its silent rise behind him. Like Vic, the wind doesn’t wait for light to rise. But unlike Vic, the wind doesn’t pity. So three miles in, the crust of the Earth had covered the lines of Vic’s face. He didn’t bother wiping the sand and dirt away. There were still 212 miles left in his day’s journey, and any movement now meant less energy later. Vic was unusually smart like that. But he was also blatantly dumb: 215 miles, during the hottest month of the year, over the windiest stretch of land in America, without any service stations for a quick Gatorade fix, and yet there he was. Life up until this point, the short twenty-some-odd years of it, had been easy. He even made a list: white boy, middle class, sober, everything about him a virgin except his right index and middle fingers. The kind of easy life that makes one seek out heat stroke, dehydration, windburn, tan lines—just to have a story to tell at a dinner table, or write about. At mile 17, a tarantula moved south across the road. Eight legs, a low-center of gravity, with more hair on its body than on Vic’s face, and Vic nearly ran the beast over. A swerve left, the collective weight of the bike and its back panniers carrying its momentum past the point of control, and worse than running the thing over, Vic fell. The road was empty, save for Vic, his bike, and his new eight-legged friend. The two looked at each other. Or perhaps Vic looked at it, and it looked at eight Vics. The two acknowledged each other’s presence. No words were passed, just a nod of the head by Vic, and a motionless nod by the spider. Neither meant to hurt the other. The connection, at that moment, sent electricity down Vic’s spine. But after getting up, and getting back on the bike, the wind blew that connection down the road behind him. Then it blew more dirt at Vic, this time into the gash on his left forearm. Mile 19 and Vic couldn’t hold it any longer, so he pulled off the side of the road, put his bike down with the gears facing the sky, and relieved himself. Still clear, he thought to himself and smiled. Then he caught himself, stopped smiling because he had been smiling, alone, about urine. Then he smiled again at feeling self-conscious at the edge of Middle America. The wind ate that smile after Vic returned to his saddle. And Vic pedaled on. Miles 21, 22, and 23 all passed in the same way. Miles 31, 32, and 33 were different. Vic’s arm had started throbbing, the gash pulsing with each pedal stroke, and a dozen or so flies stayed in Vic’s wake. Flying at seven, maybe eight miles per hour in the vacuum behind Vic was manageable. Especially with rank, salty, and bloody flesh just inches away. So the flies flew instinctively. Unlike Vic, they travelled without a choice. But in a twisted way, they all travelled for their respective survival—the flies’ being inches away, Vic’s being 182 miles away. The flies died by mile 39. Vic’s arm had worsened. So at mile 51, Vic noticed a shadow moving across his future, staying at a consistent 15 yards down the road. He looked up and noticed the buzzard, ugly and bald, looking back down at him. Vic thought nothing of it until mile 63, when another shadow moved in unison with the first shadow. Another glance up confirmed another buzzard, equally ugly and hungry as the first. Vic didn’t mind. But by mile 79, a shadow the size of a elephant covered the road just 10 yards in front of Vic. He looked up at nine buzzards, and they gawked back at him, this time their numbers emboldening them: squeals came pouring down onto Vic. He didn’t respond. A mile later, at 80, the squeals intensified, the buzzard’s shouting fists beat down onto the crown of Vic’s head. Begrudgingly, Vic stopped his bike. The arm had swelled and puss glistened under the sun. He pulled athletic tape from his bag, a handkerchief, and a bottle of vodka. The buzzards landed across the road from Vic, all nine of them. They stopped their caws, confused at what their two-legged friend was doing. Vic looked [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>8</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>On Being a Librarian, by Amanda Oliver</title>
		<link>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/04/on-being-a-librarian-by-amanda-oliver/</link>
		<comments>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/04/on-being-a-librarian-by-amanda-oliver/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 04 Apr 2013 23:26:58 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>pshirley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Amanda Oliver]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[dewey decimal system]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[hot librarian]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[how to become a librarian]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[slutty librarian]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[what librarians do]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.flipcollective.com/?p=10718</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Since I was five years old I have identified as writer. That has always made the most sense to me and felt like an intrinsic quality. Making a living as a writer can be an overwhelming process and goal, but I continue to write every day, paid or not, because it is what I love to do. I am therefore, first and foremost, a writer. However, if someone is to ask, what I do for a living, the answer is, “I am a school librarian.” I live in DC, where this is often the first and most important question you are asked when in social situations (and depending on your answer, potentially the last one). After nearly two years of living here in the nation’s capital, I have found that professing my profession receives some interesting responses. Here are the four most common: 1.) “Where are your glasses?” My glasses are at home. I wear them when I am reading. I read, too. How hysterical is that? What. a. stereotype. I am!  Where is your stethoscope? That bill you’re working on? Surely you carry those around with you at all times. 2.) “You don’t look like my school librarian.” Weird, you don’t look like that lawyer I had to get when I was seventeen and rear-ended a man in a minivan because I was busy looking at snowflakes on the windshield. You look like a rude person. Were you headed for a compliment? You were. Do the kids hit on me? No. They’re between three and eleven years old. I’m really good looking for a librarian? Thanks. I am also extremely intelligent, kind, interesting, and walking away now. 3.) “I can’t believe you need a Master’s degree to be a librarian!” I can’t believe those words actually came out of your mouth. I wouldn’t consider making an incredulous statement like that to anyone. Who raised you, Lucille Bluth? You do need a Master’s degree. I have one. I worked my ass off to get it from a very good program. I not only understand how to put a book on a shelf or how to hiss shhhh! in just the right manner to quiet a room, I am also trained in information and classification systems, binary code, computer programming, html, and MARC cataloging among many other skills. I am better at finding an answer to most things than you ever will be, as evidenced by this conversation. My brain actually functions as a catalog of information that you might be interested in had you gotten past the fact that I left my glasses at home. I am in essence, a living, breathing, walking computer. In addition, I decided to be a school librarian, which means I teach 300 students a week how to navigate the virtual world safely and effectively as well as encourage them to develop a love of reading. I guide them through the process of finding and creating questions and answers in a time where most research takes place on the often-unreliable Internet. I help children access the wealth of information they will need in order to be whatever they want to be—doctors, artists, poets, engineers, architects, graphic designers. Interested and interesting human beings. I also teach them about copyright, plagiarism, and what not to put on their Facebook profiles. I am an educator, an expert, a guardian, and a guide, and I am damn good at what I do. 4.) “Does the Dewey Decimal System still exist?!” Yes. Check out the books in 398.2. See if you can find a fairy tale about a little girl who grew up strong, intelligent, and well-read and then went on to pay her way through undergraduate and graduate school in order to pursue a profession in something she felt positively affected others, especially children. Now, imagine the chapter in that story in which she meets a knight on his noble steed at the edge of the black forest and, upon learning what she does, laughingly questions her intelligence, while focusing only on her physical appearance. And then, without skipping a beat, asks for her hand in marriage. Here in the real world, I do not want you to buy me a beer. I do not want to stand here and finish this conversation with you, either. I would rather have a brief, informative exchange with you and then walk away. ** These absurd inquiries have not been limited to males. Women have also asked these nonsensical questions, though the men usually have a different end game. Being a librarian has absolutely nothing to do with what I look like. It was not something I woke up one morning and decided would be a cute thing to do, either. Librarians play an integral roll in a world full of information, both online and off. In an age of immediate and often incorrect information, librarians help to organize and make sense of all of it. If you ask nicely (and a lot of the time even if you do not), we are happy to help you navigate it. Or design your website. Or tell you why the sky is blue and the grass is green. Or organize your research into a cohesive document. The most pleasant response I get when I state what I do for a living is this: “That’s really neat.” And, if I were to summarize what it’s like to be a librarian in just a few words, those three would be a good testament to what I do. ** Follow FlipCollective on Twitter. If you enjoyed this piece, support FlipCollective by subscribing to C A R T E L, which features all-new writing by folks like Neal Pollack, Justin Halpern, and Paul Shirley. For more from Amanda&#8230; Past work on FlipCollective.com. To follow her on Twitter. To befriend her on Facebook. To send her an email.]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>7</slash:comments>
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		<item>
		<title>A Collective Love Letter: Remembering Why We Love Who We Love, for the Sake of Equality, by Katie Levisay</title>
		<link>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/03/a-collective-love-letter-remembering-why-we-love-who-we-love-for-the-sake-of-equality-by-katie-levisay/</link>
		<comments>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/03/a-collective-love-letter-remembering-why-we-love-who-we-love-for-the-sake-of-equality-by-katie-levisay/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 03 Apr 2013 23:34:00 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>pshirley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Katie Levisay]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Politics & Opinion]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[doma bill]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gay love letters]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gay marriage debate]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gay rights]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[love letters]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[love letters about marriage]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[supreme court and gays]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.flipcollective.com/?p=10709</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Love. We all know it. We’ve all felt some manifestation of it, or hope to one day. We all need it like we need air. Over the next few months a group of people in black robes will decide who among us may be bestowed the honor of having our love and commitment legitimatized (legally and socially), and who may not. It is a momentous time for our nation’s collective identity, but it is also an opportunity for each of us individually, to reflect on our own love stories. It is my hope that doing so will serve as a personally poignant reminder, that to experience this most sacred of all emotions without prejudice is a birthright - not a privilege. ** I loved you before we ever met. The idea of you at least. Or perhaps the ideal of you. Conceived from a bewitching belief in true love, a soul mate, that lost half of which Plato wrote, which somehow managed to survive those intermittent attacks of rationality and cynicism. An abstract aggregate of all that I innately cherished but could never adequately articulate. A notion, a promise, a hope that kept me company when I was alone, or gently nagged at me when I wasn’t, but knew I should have been. A sense that there was someone out there who would implicitly get me. Understand me. Really see me. My missing piece to whom I was incomparably special, beautiful and worthy. So in essence, you’ve always been there. Here I guess, with me…a part of me. An idea. A dream, some might say. But a constant companion nonetheless. And then we met. And the rest of the world disappeared. Life circumstances were far from convenient; expectations at an all time low, and defenses sky-high. But we fell in love despite ourselves. We fell in love because of ourselves. Because we had spent that requisite and often difficult time alone, when one learns honestly and humbly who they really are, if they so choose. Vital solitude, free from the distraction inherent in being someone’s complement &#8211; erroneously or prematurely. A period of introspection, which not only helped us find one another, but also appreciate just how fortunate we were to have done so. We spent our first months inseparably like so many do, thinking of little else but the inimitable world we had created together. Craving that smile that took my breath and the kiss that could stir my soul. Days lost in laughter, genuine laughter – the kind that can unite you against the world. We were married on a perfect day. Perfect because we shared it with everyone we loved. I promised to give you the best of me and never to ask of you more than you could give. I promised that your life would never go unnoticed or unappreciated. I promised to grow with you and change with you, in order to keep our relationship alive. I promised to always find the courage to admit when I was wrong, and to love you with all that I was and all that I would become in the only way I knew how: completely and forever.  It was our day. A beautiful day. The most beautiful day.  Every day since, I’ve fallen in love with you all over again.  Fallen in love with you differently, and sometimes difficultly, but always steadily. I continue to find new ways to love the loyal friend I’ve always adored, and to be inspired by the person into whom you are growing: a life ally, a patient and irreverent parent, a boss who’s compassionate to a fault. And the best part is that with each passing day, each passing year, we get to keep falling in love with each other &#8211; even when we smell badly and are ambulating our “Depends-donning” dumpers around on Rascals, to the melodiously incessant humming of our failing hearing aid batteries, all the while laughing at our increasingly incapacitated and decreasingly flexible selves (literally and cognitively). Actually I don’t mean “even when,” I mean “especially when.” Because isn’t that what love is all about? Loving those who awaken our soul, those who make us reach for more, who plant a fire in our hearts, and bring peace to our minds. But also those who we know will see us out until the end. No matter what that end entails. And so my love, I promise to be yours until our end, because you are not only my greatest love, you are my last love. ** Now we wait. Wait while important people, sitting in big white buildings, make historic decisions about whose love and commitment count, and whose does not. In the meantime, we will either profess our support…or hide behind scripture. We may change our profile pictures to equal signs, or post religious rants, but unless we are gay or lesbian, we get to go on with our lives, unimpeded in loving whom we want. No one will tell us that our love is unworthy, unnatural, unreal, immoral, sinful, reprehensible. No one. We get to go on daydreaming about what it will be like to marry that beautiful girl with the perfect smile, who hangs on our every word. We get to go on planning our wedding, one that will emanate our flawless style and genuine love for the kindest man we’ve ever met. We get to go on reminiscing about our own special day when we were allowed to pledge our love to one another with words so personal, so genuinely crafted from the heart, that we both disintegrated into blubbering bawl-babies for all to witness (and later mock – because after all, they were our friends and we would expect nothing less). And we get to go on writing our love letters, baring the most vulnerable parts of our core, without once having to worry about a ubiquitous dark cloud of fear and prejudice hovering over our heads. A potential downpour of invalidation, constantly [...]]]></description>
		<wfw:commentRss>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/03/a-collective-love-letter-remembering-why-we-love-who-we-love-for-the-sake-of-equality-by-katie-levisay/feed/</wfw:commentRss>
		<slash:comments>2</slash:comments>
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		<title>Sport &#8220;Culture,&#8221; by Rosicky Jones</title>
		<link>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/02/sport-culture-by-rosicky-jones/</link>
		<comments>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/02/sport-culture-by-rosicky-jones/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 02 Apr 2013 18:36:36 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>pshirley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Rosicky Jones]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sports]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[coming out in the nfl]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[coming out in today's sports culture]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[first openly-gay athlete]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gay athletes]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.flipcollective.com/?p=10701</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Mike Freeman of CBSSports.com wrote that a gay NFL player is “strongly considering” coming out publicly in the near future. Freeman based his scoop on interviews with current and former NFL players. According to Freeman’s sources, the player in question is not in fear of his league, he is afraid of homophobic fans, and that is the only thing keeping him in hiding. The player goes on to say that the plan is to come out then carry on with his playing career. Homosexuality and gay rights have never been discussed more in sports than they are today. NFL players Brendon Ayanbadejo, Chris Kluwe, Scott Fujita, and many others have come out in support of gay rights. NFL Players Association executive director DeMaurice Smith has been very clear about his support of gay rights. New York Giants owner Steve Tisch came out in support of gay rights. The predominant sentiment is that the first active gay player would be celebrated. That he would be a hero to the gay community and an ally in the fight for equal rights. People are rooting for this to happen. I am not. We know that this athlete will face a life of hell from the intolerant homophobic fucks all around us. But the people clamoring for a gay athlete to come out seem to underestimate the sports world’s intolerance, its ignorance, its callousness. Well-respected Chicago sports-writers can’t even handle Derrick Rose taking a normal time to return from injury. Derrick Rose, the Chicgao Bulls’ point guard, tore up his knee on April 28, 2012 and has not returned to play yet. He says he isn’t ready and as a public figure he has never given us reason to doubt his word. He is the 2011 NBA MVP, he’s already a Chicago icon, but the sports community is beginning to turn on him. Sports writers at least understand knee injuries on account of their prevalence. But even with this knowledge they routinely begin turning the fan base against a player. The absence of tact and thoughtlessness in most sports media is the last thing we need to introduce into the gay rights discussion. And it’s not just the media; it is the fan base and the ownership. Lest we forget the Arizona State students who chanted “PLO! PLO!” at Steve Kerr after the actual PLO killed his father. The Boston Red Sox owners leaked a pain pill addiction story about Terry Francona as they were letting him go. Ownership is made up of ruthless people who don’t like boat rockers of any kind. And they aren’t very skilled at handling civil rights issues. The Houston Rockets, one of the better managed teams in any sport, have bungled the handling of Royce White. They drafted him, with knowledge of his anxiety disorder, and have mishandled it ever since. If there is one thing athletic entities botch as much as homosexuality it’s the handling of mental disorders. Add in the uneducated-on-the-subject-but-opinionated-as-hell media and fan base, and you’re left with a less-than-ideal environment for someone who suffers from an anxiety disorder. Not the ideal environment of compassion, empathy, or patience needed for a prominent athlete to calmly come out of the closet to. During this year’s NFL combine, players were asked if they were gay by NFL execs. This was on the heels of the Manti Te&#8217;o “could he be gay?” catfishing fiasco. NFL execs do not want gay athletes on their teams. They do not want boat rockers – they want robots. Creative, outspoken, or difficult players are jettisoned, usually completely out of their respective leagues. Sports culture is uncompromising and dangerous. Dangerous, fueling the culture that publicly and repeatedly raped a high school girl in Stubenville, Ohio. A rape culture that completed its football quid pro quo by siding, defending, and accommodating the football-playing rapists. And we debate whether or not an active gay athlete should come out or not. I worry about the risk. But when you think about it, we don’t need to prognosticate at all. We don’t need to analyze the what-ifs, because we already know how it will be handled. We just need to take a look at how society at large handles homosexuality. We just need to take a look at how society at large handles mental disorder. Even though it treats gay people like bacteria and demonizes the mentally ill, we expect the wide world of sports to somehow be better than us. A prominent and active athlete coming out would be a profound social moment, and I believe it will be of net benefit to society. But what’s beneficial to the whole isn’t always beneficial for the individual. I worry for a publicly gay athlete. Our society isn’t really accepting. ** Follow FlipCollective on Twitter. If you enjoyed this piece, support FlipCollective by subscribing to C A R T E L, which features all-new writing by folks like Neal Pollack, Justin Halpern, and Paul Shirley. For more from Rosicky&#8230; Past work on FlipCollective.com. To follow him on Twitter. To send him an email.]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>34</slash:comments>
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		<title>Crush Me, Flush Me, Let Me Go, by Scott Muska</title>
		<link>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/02/crush-me-flush-me-let-me-go-by-scott-muska/</link>
		<comments>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/02/crush-me-flush-me-let-me-go-by-scott-muska/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 02 Apr 2013 18:02:19 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>pshirley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Fiction]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Scott Muska]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[breakups]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[dealing with breakups]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ending a relationship]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[how to fix a toilet]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[how to get over a girl]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[the end of a relationship]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.flipcollective.com/?p=10697</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[When she left, the only tangibles that didn’t go with her were an old gray T-shirt she liked to sleep in, a fluorescent green toothbrush, and a black hair tie. Initially you thought she’d taken everything aside from the smell of her hair, which was still on your pillows and your sheets. You refused to wash those sheets for much longer than you care to admit, even now. Especially since that smell was, she had admitted during the brief break-up discussion, also lingering on another boy’s sheets, in a bedroom in another borough. She left, and you stopped doing whatever it was you were doing before, which was, you suppose, doing what you could to build a life with her. One you hoped and even assumed had potential to last until one of you died. You went to work, but took sick days on the premise you were physically ill instead of metaphorically heartbroken (because if your heart was literally broken you’d be fucking dead, and because if calling in because you’re sad about being dumped is probably a fireable offense). During these days of sickness, you wouldn’t even watch television. You’d just wake up, call in, then toss back a few pills for allergies or a cough or whatever,  as long as they had something that would help knock you out until the evening time, when you would wake up and listen to music by empathetic artists while you stared at the ceiling, replaying memories all the way back to the night you kind-of-sort-of met, when you didn’t really talk to her except to nod that yes, you would hold one of her legs up so she could execute a keg stand. And when you stopped you didn’t really pick up with much else. Not even drinking or drugs or anything. You didn’t really even eat that much anymore, which was odd because before you were damn near gluttonous, to the point that your roommate’s simultaneous admiration and disgust filled the air. He noticed right quick you hadn’t been eating – because he was fending for himself at dinnertime for the first time since you’d moved in. “I’m about to order some Asian Yummy House,” he said one night when you walked out of your room and opened the fridge. “You want anything?” You declined, said you were only snagging some water, and he said “Dude, food is good. You need to eat. I’ll even buy you some of those crab rangoons or whatever the fuck you like so much.” “I’m good,” you said, looking up from the fridge. “I eat. Just trying to get healthier with it. Fiber and stuff. It keeps you regular. Actually, I have to take a shit right now.” Then you went into the bathroom, sat down, and let one go. When you tried to flush it, nothing happened. When shit’s not going well, it’s the little things that help hold you together. Like being able to flush your actual shit without too much of a hassle. But now you had to lift the porcelain cover and manually pull up on the plug that set the flush in motion. The chain connecting the flush handle (technically: the trip lever) to the plug had rusted and eroded away, eventually breaking in two. The little things can also put you over the edge. The commode malfunction was enough to make you cry for the first time since she’d broken up with you. You weren’t just tearing up, either. You were sitting on a toilet – which was full of all kinds of terrible things – in your tiny bathroom, busting out some heaving, wracking sobs. The ones where you have to inhale in sets of three before releasing a long labored breath. You cradled your head in your hands, forgetting one of the hands was wet from the aforementioned manual flush. You crawled into bed and cried some more. ** Three weeks of manual flushing came and went. You and roommate adopted an unspoken “If it’s yellow, let it mellow” mandate, and you tried everything you could to return yourself to normalcy. You threw yourself into your work, and when you weren’t doing that you went out drinking with friends. The time in between was spent either in bed or exercising, something you picked up as a sort of outlet after your brother told you living well is the best revenge. ** First, you found the toothbrush in a glass inside your mirror cabinet. There hadn’t been occasion to look in there until you decided eventually to bust out the shaving foam and get rid of the sad, spotty growth you’d been wearing half out of despondency and half so people might feel sorry for you, that they wouldn’t expect you to keep up with personal grooming norms while your heart was in such squalor. You left it there. Because you never know, right? She could come back – something you would accept without hesitance – and you could say, “I thought you might. See? I kept your toothbrush.” The T-shirt was crumpled and wedged at the end of your bed, under the comforter. You found it when you finally changed the sheets, which wasn’t done symbolically. You had just been spooked by a story your mom had emailed you about bed bug outbreaks and you didn’t want to – or didn’t think you could – deal with that kind of extreme inconvenience in your current state. (You hadn’t forgotten that you’d broken down on a commode mid-shit weeks before, and that you’d broken down frequently since then, most recently when someone played a Lifehouse song on a bar jukebox. Fucking Lifehouse had made you cry. In public.) You smelled the shirt, which still held her scent mixed with that of your own dirty feet, and stared at it for a few minutes before you swept it under your bed. Just in case. The hair tie was on the nightstand next to her side of the [...]]]></description>
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		<title>The Longer You Watch March Madness&#8230;, by Matt Shirley</title>
		<link>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/01/the-longer-you-watch-march-madness-by-matt-shirley/</link>
		<comments>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/04/01/the-longer-you-watch-march-madness-by-matt-shirley/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 01 Apr 2013 19:14:31 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>admin</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Matt Shirley]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sports]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[basketball graphs]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[funny graphs]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[graphs about march madness]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[kevin ware]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[march madness]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[march madness 2013]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ncaa tournament]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ncaa tournament brackets]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.flipcollective.com/?p=10685</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[College basketball season is almost over and with it comes the end of the hysteria that is March Madness. You&#8217;ve probably noticed that you do things a little differently as the tournament progresses. You might be the kind of person whose intensity for the tournament prevails throughout. Or you might be the type of person who gave up caring after day one, and just follow along so you&#8217;ll have something to talk about with your know-it-all, jackass friends. Either way, we all share common thoughts and feels as we watch. Thoughts and feelings that are easily translated to a line graph. ** Follow FlipCollective on Twitter. For more from Matt&#8230; Past work on FlipCollective.com. To follow him on Twitter. To befriend him on Facebook.]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>28</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Very Scientific Observations on Dreams, by Rob Moreschi</title>
		<link>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/03/29/very-scientific-observations-on-dreams-by-rob-moreschi/</link>
		<comments>http://www.flipcollective.com/2013/03/29/very-scientific-observations-on-dreams-by-rob-moreschi/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 29 Mar 2013 17:25:16 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>pshirley</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Rob Moreschi]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[dream interpretation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[dreams]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[inception plot]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[lucid dreams]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[my life is like inception]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[nightmares]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[worst dreams]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.flipcollective.com/?p=10678</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[My dreams have a mind of their own. Because I’m soooo unique. The truth is, pretty much everyone&#8217;s dreams have a mind of their own: your own mind. “Whoooaaaa.” &#60; &#8211; Delivered in Neo’s voice. See, when you go to sleep, your mind runs shit. Anything goes. There are no rules in Dreamland. While not formally recognized by the science community as a “doctor of science,” I did get an A in Psychology 207, so I can tell you with some degree of certainty that dreams serve a number of different, useful functions for us while we’re asleep, including: helping to restore cognitive stuff, improving long-term and short-term memory stuff, doing other helpful stuff that involve neurons and myelin sheath maybe, and pissing us the fuck off. It’s that last thing that I’m here to talk about today. Because that last thing is what dreams are really the best at doing. ** When they’re asleep, our brains love to fully immerse our subconscious in a fantastical dream world where everyone shits rainbows and things you can never attain in the waking world come so easily. It’s all very whimsical really, and we all know how fond I am of whimsy. So, so fond. These are the fun dreams. Maybe one night your left arm is a calzone filled with sausage, but you can’t eat it because it’s your arm. So fun, but so frustrating! Or maybe it’s one of those dreams where you’re playing basketball and you keep getting fast breaks but your legs feel like they’re filled with rubber cement and you miss the wide-open layup every single time. Then you realize somewhere in the middle that you’re actually dreaming and that maybe you shouldn’t eat so much cheese before bed. I call these the &#8220;this is too ridiculous to ever happen, so it must be a dream&#8221; dream. That name is way too long, so that&#8217;s why most people use the scientifically correct “lucid dream”. But it’s not these preposterously unbelievable dreams that make us mad in the morning. No, the ones that really get your blood boiling in the morning are those dreams that contain a small and subtle number of unrealistic components but, for the most part, seem like they could really happen. It’s these dreams that really fuck with you, and it seems like they have fun doing it. For some reason, your mind enjoys creating reasonable facsimiles of your waking life and inserting itself into these scenarios that are actually possible and somewhat attainable and then mocking you for believing it by waking you up at the worst possible moment. It’s like when you were little and your parents used to keep things they didn’t want you to get way up on top of the refrigerator. Of course it wasn’t entirely impossible to get stuff down from there – you could always stand on a wobbly chair on your tip-toes and reach for it – but for the most part, it was. And the worst part was that you could see it sitting there, just out of reach. Realistic dreams are the WORST and because they’re being produced by your own subconscious, they’re always only going to feature the things you secretly (or maybe not so secretly) want the most. This is what’s so infuriating about them. It’s like they’ve been custom designed in some dingy dream warehouse by tiny Jigsaws with the sole intent of torturing you in new, elaborate ways every night. For example, I’ve won the lottery so many times in dreams that I should have passed Carlos Slim on the Forbes list of the richest people in the world about six or seven years ago. Want to know how I know my brain is fucking with me? I don’t even play the lottery. Maybe once or twice a year when the jackpot is ridiculously high and everyone in the world suddenly believes they have a chance to win even though they own more than three teeth and a job. Want more proof that our subconscious mind uses dreams to torture us? Just the other night I had a dream while I was in another dream. If that sounds like the plot of Inception, that’s because it fucking is. Do you know what it’s like to wake up from a great, realistic dream, but not realize that you’re still dreaming until you wake up again? I mean, for all I know, this could be a dream right now. Pure insanity. (Although I’ll admit that if this was a dream, this piece would be A LOT better.) By the way, how tired am I that I dream about going to sleep and dreaming? I think it’s more likely that my subconscious is trying to tell me that I need to get more sleep than anything else. So next time someone says to you, &#8220;In your dreams&#8221; tell them to fuck off, and remember all of this the next time you try to fall asleep, ideally for two to three hours before you realize that it’s already 2 AM and you have to be awake for work in a few hours and holy shit why can’t you fall asleep? You may be setting yourself up for a major disappointment come morning. But then again, you may be disappointed every morning no matter what. I can&#8217;t speak for everybody. ** Follow FlipCollective on Twitter. If you enjoyed this piece, support FlipCollective by subscribing to C A R T E L, which features all-new writing by folks like Neal Pollack, Justin Halpern, and Paul Shirley. For more from Rob&#8230; Past work on FlipCollective.com. To follow him on Twitter.]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>6</slash:comments>
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