"I either love you or not" and other things my grandmother has said, plus the context in which she's said them, PLUS jokes and more!

the iris archives continue!

dear friends, family, fans, fellow folks,

i’m glad that you’re here.
thank you for being here and you.
and now, here are a few quick jokes PLUS a longer piece that i shared a year ago for paid subscribers only but now i’m happy to make available for ALL.

it’s an edition of The Iris Archives, where i share some interactions i had with my Grandma Iris who died in 2020 but left behind her a long legacy of facebook comments.

but first, three silly things!

A) is for Anger:

the buddha never honked at anyone.
but also, the buddha never had a car.
perhaps the buddha would have laid on his horn.
perhaps not.

B) is for Buddhism:

at the end of a buddhist's life,
they find out how much phone screen time they used
compared to their other lives.

C) is for Cows:

there's a story in buddhism about a sad farmer coming up to a group of monks including the buddha and asking if they'd seen his missing cows.

the buddha later tells the monks that they're lucky; they have no cows to lose.

i like it. i also like how bart simpson encapsulated that message even more simply: “don't have a cow, man.”

and those are the quick silly things!
now, for this gem from the Iris Archives:

AROUND THIS TIME IN 2017, I POSTED THIS ON FACEBOOK:

sometimes dudes who want to hurt me will tell me that i'm gay.
sometimes the same dudes will tell me that i'll never get laid.
but from what i understand, there are a lot of gay men who get laid quite a bit,
so what they’re saying doesn’t hurt really hurt me.
it DOES hurt a bit to know that there are these sad dudes out there, though.
you win, sad dudes. you got me.

MY ALMOST 90-YEAR-OLD GRANDMOTHER THEN RESPONDED:

How does anyone know what anyone is?
Seems to me, it is no one’s business.

AND THEN I RESPONDED:

1) certainly, no one can know what another person is experiencing, unless they share it with them.
2) if people want to share who they are with others, i encourage that.
3) if people want to share what they think about who OTHERS are, i think that says more about who THEY are, than the other.

THEN ANOTHER FRIEND RESPONDED WITH THREE FIRE EMOJIS AND THEN MY GRANDMOTHER RESPONDED AGAIN:

People are getting weirder and weirder.
I either love you or not, no matter what your sexual preference is.

AND THEN I WROTE BACK:

awww, thank you my loving grandmother. i love YOU no matter what your sexual preference is.
and
i think that people aren't necessarily any different inside than they have always been, but that it used to be more difficult for people who were gay to share that with the world, for example. so it might seem like there are more gay people now than ever before, but it's likely that there were just as many proportionally always, and you just didn't know who they were because it wasn't as safe to come out as it is now. (not that it's entirely safe now, but in many ways it can be safer.)

AND SHE WROTE BACK:

I hope it IS safe.
I have trouble understanding why that is anybody else's problem.
Like I said they are weird, maybe nosy and stupid are better words.

AND ALSO SHE WROTE:

thank you

AND THEN I WROTE:

it is definitely not completely safe, but it is safer, and the more people there are who encourage people to be who they are, and let them know that it is safe, the safer it becomes.

AND THEN THE FINAL WORD FROM MY ATHEIST GRANDMOTHER:

From your mouth to everyone's ears.

SO, YOU HEAR THAT, EVERYONE’S EARS? FROM MY GRANDMOTHER’S MOUTH!

thanks for receiving! now, for some questions for YOU, if you’d like to share anything with MY ears:

1) how are you doing? how is your heart? what is new and good?
2) do you have a Grandma Iris figure in your life?
3) any stories you’d like to share about such a figure?
4) do you think the buddha would lay on his horn if he had a car?
5) how are you doing NOW?

finally, here are a few shows i have coming up!

— Sacramento, CA on December 23
— Mill Valley, CA on December 26
— Manteca, CA on December 27
— San Rafael, CA on December 31
— Ogden, UT on January 26-27, 2024!

and more to come at myqkaplan.com!

FINALLY finally, here’s a nice drawing of me that my friend joe karg did. joe is great and i recommend following him and looking at all his art!
much love and thanks to you and yours and all, all!