Introduction

Welcome to Thursday's Unused Draft Drop, for the Feast of the Real Presence. I thought I'd do something food related, because on this day God made himself food. So it's on brand... This also goes in the book of shadows series.

Mystical Cheeseburger

I had a semi mystical experience while eating an objectively bad burger at 2am. I forgot to salt the beef before i made it you see and the bun was a bit stale. But here's how that happened. Our church is doing an education session on the history of disability rights in America. a project which. I am heavily involved as you might guess.

Awhile back i was going through the then upcoming section on Deinstitutionalization, and part of that involved watching the footage of Revera's expose of Willowbrook State School. There's a rather big Trigger Warning with that so don't Google lightly... And you can bet i was triggered, To know that such a thing could've happened to me. If i had been born just 10 years earlier then i was.

I had a bit of trouble sleeping, so i decided to watch something, happier and have some food. This is where the cheeseburger enters the picture. Don't know why i made a cheeseburger at 2am. With the good meat no less, my burger smasher thingy was dirty so i had to press that baby out by hand. Anyway i made my burger, was watching my movie, as i said the burger was not my best work.

Now for some context on the mystical part of this whole shindig, because a lot of people aren't aware of what i mean when i say The Communion of the Saints. So anyway as a Catholic I believe in the immortality of the soul. The only way a soul can be destroyed is if God destroys it. And God doesn't do that to just anyone for not going to Mass on Sunday, one really has to earn it. But enough of that we're not here to talk about death, hell and the last judgement.

Anyway Soul is immortal, life doesn't end, it just changes. The positive side of this teaching is the Communion of the Saints. Basically everyone who has ever lived, and who either cooperated with God's grace on earth or went through Purgatory. Is alive and with God right at this moment, and intercede for us here below or sometimes manifest to us in various ways. Anyway we're getting off topic, Catholic thought on the afterlife is a rabbit hole that is so vast, deep and weird. That one could spend a lifetime studying it and only scratch the surface. I give an overview here for context.

Now I've always believed in this teaching, even before i was Catholic, and I've sometimes experienced it, but i've never really trusted my mystical experiences before because Bipolar. I've always gone into a manic episode shortly after a mystical experience. I've never just had one while stable before.

Until last week, when eating the cheeseburger at 2am, while watching a documentary about queer furries. I got almost knocked over by a powerful sense that i was surrounded by people, and then i realized that. What i was doing right then was exactly what ever disabled person, has fought for the right to do. I didn't have to ask anyone's permission, I had the tools and accommodations, that made it safe to do. I just decided that 2am burger was going to happen and made it so. Self Determination in action

It was only a momentary thing, but i swear i felt all my disabled ancestors, both in a family sense and in the broader sense surrounding me and smiling.