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April 6th, Two Thousand Five: Adventures in Grocery Shopping, Episode 96:
Yeah, yeah, I know. We're all bored with how annoying I find the market down the
block. And yes, I could go to another one. The big, big grocery
won't work for my eating style at all (and HUGE markets for ADD-folks?
Not so much), but the co-op is only six blocks away. It is, however,
way more expensive and a longer walk for someone who does walk,
not drive. I have a good market not even two blocks away, and
gawdammit, I'm going to shop there.
(And isn't it neat that now and then I write about things like
grocery shopping so we can all remember that there really ARE
moments of my life which are utterly average, droll and normal?
Sure it is. Now sit nice and quiet while I tell y'all a story.)
Today, the usual battles with bagging my stuff and then walking
out with it reached new heights.
I had my large messenger bag with me, as I'd been biking all over
the city running errands. I had two string bags. These three bags
were easily enough to put all the goods in. As I was being rung
up, I started bagging. Then a bagger came over, and said she could
do that for me; I said thanks, but I had it. She tried again:
I washed, rinsed, repeated.
Then another came over RIGHT after she left, saying he'd get that.
I said, again and very politely, that that was okay, I walked
and it was easier for me just to bag it myself.
Note: some of the reason for me wanting to bag myself is that
the folks at the market don't seem to get, ever, how very much
string bags can expand, and toss three or four things in there
then start grabbing the paper bags when they not only aren't needed,
they're trickier to carry home in groups. Too, my messenger bag
not only has my personal life in it, I'd also realized it had
some aspects of my personal life in it left from the trip to WA
which I didn't want the baggers rooting round in. I should also
add that I am not only a very good bagger, I am lightning fast,
having worked in a co-op for some time during college and the
end of high school. So.
Anyway, then one MORE woman comes up (what is this, market-triage?),
and not only does she say she'll do it (mind you, say, not ask), she is pushing me out of the way with her body while
smiling at me.
I do not like being shoved. No, not even with a smile. Shoving with a smile is the equivalent
of backhanding someone in the teeth then saying "Oh gee, excuse
me!"
At this point, I cry out, "Bloody HELL! I am bagging my groceries myself. No, you may NOT do it. You MAY help someone else who wants you to bag for them. That person
is not me." Then I smile, big, with all my big teeth and my freckles and
my two messy braids, trying to look both unbudgeable and terrifyingly
pleasant, just like I'm learning from the baggers. They go away
and stop asking.
But wait, there's more! When I finally get the damn things bagged,
pay, and load my messenger on my back and go to grab the two bags,
I get to -- for the fifty gazillionth time in that store -- defend
my ability to then CARRY the groceries. They very, very much want
to carry them to my car. I do not have a car, and inform them
of this, per usual. Which you'd think -- wouldn't you? -- would
take care of the matter.
Nah.
The woman who rang me out, is all "You CANNOT walk with all of those. I couldn't even get them to
the DOOR. And you're so little!" (This is what I get for going shopping during first-freckle season
with braids in, my boobs bound and in sneakers instead of my usual
big boots.)
I inhale slowly. I exhale slowly.
I very, very calmly -- the kind of whispery, barely contained calm my mother
always had when she was furious, which was scary as hell -- explain
that not only can I indeed carry them, but I can knock the wind
out a 250-pound man, and do so often, as well as biking and walking
nearly everywhere. (I resist the urge to brag about my endless
sexual stamina, as well, despite the fact that just a couple weeks
ago, a male friend of mine told me I could pick up someone anywhere,
even in the grocery store, without trying. I wasn't in the mood
to test that theory today. Whoever I picked up prolly would have
wanted to carry my bags, besides, and then I'd have to hurt them.
) Carrying three bags of groceries two sodding blocks is hardly
a trial.
She is STILL arguing with me. I finally suggest that perhaps the
fine folks at the market might consider the fact that if the majority
of people who both worked and shopped here were in the HABIT of
carrying anything more than the four feet from the SUV to their door, most people
be able to do it pretty quickly and would even benefit from the
grueling exercise. I also suggest that my groceries, which this
particular woman is always remarking on as being so terrifyingly
healthy, might perhaps be considered something of a clue should
one want to do Olympic feats like walk two blocks with three stinking
bags of groceries. I say this hairy-eyeballing the Coke and the
donut sitting on her little shelf.
As I tossed the bags over my shoulder, I smiled again, and said,
sweet as sugar, that I hoped she had a lovely day and that I also
hoped this would be the very last time we had this particular
conversation.
Hope springs eternal. As do baggers, unfortunately. |
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April 5th, Two Thousand Five: Things to do when book revisions are making you psychotic:
• Clean your fridge to within an inch of its life. Right now,
I could safely perform open heart surgery in mine. It's that spotless.
(And yes, for those who are regrettably familiar with the usual
state of my fridge, I'm not telling tall tales.)
• Begin creating a page-a-day calendar with editorial suggestions
from book manuscripts which are the most outer limits, tentatively
titled "365 days on the crack we can't even afford with our crappy
advances."
• Move a dumpster to the bottom of the back stairs, three flights
below your back porch. Hurl glass jar and bottles and listen to
the sweet sounds of satisfying smash. Shred the most irritating
of printed comments and see the little puppies fly, fly away.
Throw large, old wooden speakers and observe how they splinter.
Should any neighbors appear disgruntled by this, allow them to
observe the five pens lost in your hair, the jammie pants you
have worn for three days solid and the utterly deranged look on
your face. Watch them walk away, slowly, backwards and smiling
very, very politely at you.
• Think of Jhames' story with the waterbed and the sailboats.
Giggle.
• Envision wild dogs eating your enemies, feet first, slowly.
Pretend to be mortified by this (really quite comforting) visual image you have created.
• Allow your mind to lock on something far, far more pleasant.
Like, perhaps, the airport kiss you have been promised a mere
ten days from now which is rumored to rival, if not surpass, this one. Or what likely will follow said kiss.
• Think of things in the word which are far more irritating than
this: Trent Reznor, for instance. Lactose intolerance. Minnesota
drivers. Poverty. Waking up first thing of a morning to discover
there is no coffee. Dental bills. Missing that one vital ingredient
you need for a dish after the market has closed. Being buzzkilled
two seconds before a giant orgasm. Locking oneself out of the
house when it's subzero out and you have to pee. The entire federal
administration. The inevitable decline and death of one's favorite
stompy black boots. Overcooked vegetables. The inability to teleport,
and the great inflexibility of the time-space continuum as a whole.
The too-high-cost of Lush goodies. Bad haircuts. A glass that's
not just half-empty, it's barren.
• Sing "I Wanna Be Sedated" as a belt-from-the-gut torch song
in the shower.
• Make yourself a t-shirt which reads "I can put that red pen in more suitable places than my manuscript.
Ask me how!"
• Beer. Beautiful, foamy beer and your best friend.
• Inventory your underpants. Wonder exactly how many asses one
person really has, anyway.
• Rearrange your bookshelves so that each section is a different
dinner party of authors and artists. Seat Beardsley with Faludi,
Plath with Annie Sprinkle, Kahlo with Tolstoy, Marcuse with Arendt
and Angela Davis with Freud, just for kicks.
• Answer a few advice questions to remind yourself why you go
to all this trouble in the first place. But not too many.
• Work on your taxes as a distraction. Note this is LESS irritating
by comparison: it is almost relaxing. Bathe in your utter amazement.
• Say fuck all, grab your bike with designs on breathing deep,
sunning your pasty, furry calves and stocking up on endorphins.
Dear You-Know-Who-You-Are: I decided that subtlety was not, and
has never been, my art, per the oh-so-secret journal messages,
and that my brain is far too dysfunctional to be that swift today,
regardless. Just took a long spin around the lakes, envious of
your inspired hooky-playing yesterday. No baby ducks yet, but
perhaps they'll show up by the time you get here. There were,
however, several women walking around the lakes in low-riding
sweatpants with the word "juicy" emblazoned upon their bottoms,
which you might have enjoyed. I know I did. It's balmy and beautiful
outside: here's hoping it holds up, even though I have few plans
for you during your visit which involve allowing you extended
leave of my apartment. Or my thighs, for that matter, which I
made a point of giving some extra conditioning today for our mutual
benefit by doing the ride at an insanely low gear. I believe there
were at least ten new freckles gathered today en route: I'll show
you mine if you show me yours. Do RSVP. |
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April 2nd, Two Thousand Five: The short list
1. I managed to hammer out 60 pages of revisions and edits yesterday,
with only moderate amounts of yelling at inanimate pages. Go me,
go.
2. I learned the book needs be cut down from almost 650 single-sided,
double-spaced pages to 450. (Do I wish I had this information
when I started writing this at the end of '03? Yes, yes I do.)
Oddly enough, I think I can actually do this with my personal
integrity and sense of social responsibility intact.
3. I want this bike. In lieu of having it, I endeavor to grab a few miles on mine
today on the way to and from training, to the post office, and
if the weather is as lovely as it looks, this year's first roll
spin around one of the lakes before I head back to an afternoon
of more revisions and edits. My original plan was to do revisions
half a day, every day, but this was a silly plan, as I have known
since I was a kid that I work far better in long, marathon stretches
where I can have hyperfocus until I drop and then take a couple
days away before more marathoning. If I can get 200 pages of rough
revised work done by Monday morning, I will be in VERY good shape.
4. I had forgotten the sort of woo that can happen when two faraway
artists, especially two visual artists and writers, embark upon an affair. Color me most tickled, highly
distractible, and highly inspired to creative mischief-making.
I ran into my postman yesterday, who appeared more than a little
entertained himself. I resisted the urge to up the ante by belting
out "Please, Mr. Postman" at him on the stoop, but only because
I realized I was sitting outside in the late afternoon in my jammies
and that typical as that may be, between the jammies and recent
mail, I had probably freaked him out enough already. That, and
Sofia sucks at backup harmony.
5. Less than two weeks. Just sayin'. La la la.
6. Group birthday plans are now made and verified. Anyone who
wants the super-secret bar location whom I spaced sending an invite
to should email me. This should prove to me a more than slightly
amusing social experiment, for reasons I shall not disclose.
7. The smoking ban went into effect here. Life has become less
fun. And much colder.
8. I need a haircut. With the humidity rising, I appear to have
enough hair at the moment to be a five-person 80's hair band,
all by myself.
9. Two nights in a row, I have actually gotten this elusive thing
often known as a full night's sleep. I feel funny.
10. I have discovered, sadly, over the last couple of months,
that the Heather Corinna Lending Library has gone too far, as
several of my favorite books are missing, including one very rare
copy of Remedios Varo's biography, with full-color plates, nearly
all of the Tom Robbins I own, and a bunch of Octavia Butler. Anyone
who currently has books of mine, I beg of you to bring them back
to me. I miss them, and they miss me.
(I must go punch and kick things now, spin in circles and yell
"Ha!" a lot while I do, a sentiment which can be interpreted any number
of ways, but is best considered from several feet away.) |
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March 31st, Two Thousand Five: Apparently, when you end up pinching a nerve in your neck, quite
painfully, while masturbating no less, and share that this occurred
during a particularly magnificent orgasm sponsored in part by
visions and remembrances of someone's particular talents with
the owner of said talents, the response is not one of sympathy.
Apparently this is, instead, considered to be quite the coup.
Hmph.
And apparently, the lack of sympathy can be so profound that the
aforementioned masturbatory muse seems to feel the need, after
this event, to torment the injured party on the telephone in the
wee hours with more-than-intermittent and rather detailed taunting
as to how one's neck and other parts might be remedied were said
party present.
Apparently, in two weeks, someone else's parts are going to find
themselves mighty sore and they may well sincerely regret both
the lack of sympathy and the merciless teasing.
Regret may not be the best word. Apparently.
* * *
Did just find out that the drag shows this month are only on Thursday
and Friday, due to the space being rented out on Saturday night,
when I'd planned to finish the shows with the communal birthday
bash there, so I now need dream up a new locale for at least a
brief foray out of bed over that weekend, or else the both of
us are going to need more than neck massages by Monday: we're
going to need wheelchairs.
Yes, this is my carrot (as it were), and you bet your bum I'm
hanging unto it for dear life. I'm only a week or so into the
revisions and already, I feel totally overwhelmed, conflicted
and exhausted. It was overwhelming enough writing all 600+ pages
of the first draft in around eight months last year, and revising
same in just around two months feels somehow even more daunting.
It's difficult to feel I'm achieving much, hammering away at handfuls
of pages a day, but still seeing these three full binders that
need to be finished before June. Just call me Sisyphus.
I've started to have to tell friends that I need to be as much
of a hermit as possible over the next two months, something I
always have a hard time doing, especially to the friends who are
often the least demanding of my time and energy. But when even
keeping the house marginally clean, fitting in training and keeping
up-to-date with just a handful of freelance photo jobs starts
to become a trial, and when doing all the other work I do in a
day on top of all of that is literally impossible, something's
got to give. (That said: a request? I've gotten more than one
email/phone call from folks taking my lack of response or availability
personally, and please don't. Not only is it in no way personal,
guilting me in any way about it just isn't cool. There aren't
enough words to express how heavy my workload is right now, with
little pay for it all, to boot, and how much I'd SO rather be
doing anything else if I could. Believe me.)
And with that, I'm back to the mines, stiff neck, Camusesque posturing,
carrot(top) daydreaming, and all. |
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March 29th, Two Thousand Five: Book revisions, oral surgery, book revisions, taxes, friends
in crisis, book revisions, insomnia, book revisions, one fine
head cold, book revisions, late night phone calls, housecleaning,
book revisions, walks in nice weather while we got it, portrait
clients, the ninth circle of dating hell, and then some more book
revisions.
That sums up the last week as well as to be expected. My goal
is to revise, edit and cut back over 600 pages of work by the
end of May, which puts me at around 20 pages a day, on top of
other bits that need to be done to complete it, so suffice it
to say, the book revisions are taking center stage. I'm taking
solace in the fact that it's entirely possible I will never write
a book of this initial length again. I'd like to say I will also
never write anything this controversial or loaded, as well, but
I think we all know that's highly unlikely. In fact, two out of
three of my next book ideas are even more loaded than this one,
and even more likely to incite ire and venom. So, there goes that
wish.
My 35th birthday is in less than three weeks, which just strikes
me as CRAZY. Five minutes ago, I swear, I was in college with
my hair down to my tuchas with flowers bundled in it, and my long
skirts, buried in my huge piles of Blake and Buber and Emerson
on the grass. Ten minutes ago, I was panhandling for bus fare
to get home in high school. But that was 20 years ago. Right about now 35 years ago, my mother was deciding to have
her labor induced if I didn't show up soon so she and I and my
Dad could get the heck outta dodge before he got arrested for
resisting the draft. Unreal.
In any event, I decided that at 35, I should, if nothing else,
have the ability to wave my fingers and be treated like an utter
goddess on my birthday, without a single moment of displeasure,
and with more than a few moments spent reduced to monosyllables,
at least for a day or two. To that end, I am importing someone
from out of town who is more than up to the task at hand, and
not at all unenthusiastic about said mission. This pleases me
more than a little bit. Now, if I can only also wave my fingers
and make this happen for everyone else in my orbit on those days,
all will be good. Hey, hope springs eternal, and when hope alone
doesn't suffice, one can always unplug the phone, set the attack
pug at the door and administer tequila and bourbon as needed.
Sadly, all of the busy hasn't left me time to do any new artwork
over the last couple weeks, so I'm hoping to find a way to make
some time for that somehow in the next few days. One of the troubles
with getting more paying work per the photography is that most
of it is for private clients: so, I've actually done more than
a little really good work of late, but it's nothing I can show
publicly. To boot, the book revisions format my brain in such
a way that I find it a bit difficult to switch back and forth
between visual art and contraceptive statistics without more than
quite a lot of dischord. So it goes.
And with that, I'm off to go accompany a friend to an appointment
and then go help The Ex-Girl clean out her old apartment and settle
into her new one. Plans after that include taking my sore-toothed
and throated self to bed with more -- guess what? -- book revisions,
a bunch of soup, and some crafty CD mixing.
Yep, it's a thrill a minute over here. Don't slip off the edge
o'yer seats or nuthin'. |
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March 24th, Two Thousand Five: So, before the trip even began, the rules were that what happened
in Washington stayed in Washington, for the protection of everyone
involved. Not just me. (But probably mostly me.)
The morning after the wedding, I awoke after a few very short
-- but very sound --hours of sleep in a cheesy hotel with no idea
where I was. I know -- who'da thunk something like THAT would
happen to someone like ME. You're shocked, shocked, and gosh-gee-golly,
I sure was, too.
In any event, stumbling into the loo, I discovered this oh-so
luxurious "guest towel," educating me on the some of the many
fine and endless uses of paper towels.
Fancy that!
So, while I am honorably sworn not to report any of the activities of the time spent in Washington, allow me instead
to do some copyediting and list a few more uses said towel may
have provided had I had such a handy item in my possession throughout.
- With our compliments...
- use this towel to clean your shoes,
- luggage, windshield, razor,
- to apply ice to the unavoidable pre-wedding head wounds of wily
preteen women,
- in case you need to tidy up after nearly peeing in the bushes
while lost near the border of Canada with Jhames,
- to daub the tears of melting-down brides, or their sappy, sentimental
friends (coughsputterahem),
- as a blanket when everyone else is passed out in a certain foggy
oblivion before you can ask about linens,
- to stifle a political or academic debate by politely stuffing
the mouth of one of the participating parties of your choosing,
- to fashion a charming pair of knickers when yours have mysteriously
gone missing,
- to sop up the wine trail left on a stairwell so no one can find
the crazy redheads in hiding, or to clean up a mouthful of alcohol spit out by those sitting close
to a table with two sex writers and their guests,
- to covertly dispense chemical agents to those in dire need,
- as a trendy and absorbent headcovering when it refuses to stop
raining during wedding photos,
- to daub the drool running down your chin from the enthusiastic
and expert application of someone's quite surprisingly gifted
and generous digits,
- to give three daughters something new and exciting to fight over
when all other items have been run through,
- to write REAL instructions on how to get to and operate the boat
you really did have every intention of staying on, preferably
before anyone with said instructions has hit the booze,
- to wave as a white flag of surrender in the middle of rural nowhere
when you find yourself feet away from a wrestling match on a kitchen
floor in a house and crew not much unresembling the scary rambler
in "Boys Don't Cry,"
- as a pillow when, moments after taking a sleeping pill to deal
with your plane phobia, you are deplaned and need to stay awake
for an additional hour before replaning,
- to supplement your fiber sources when vegan options are unavailable,
- to hide behind when having to do any form of public speaking,
or when grinning like an idiot at a post-wedding breakfast in
an undignified fashion,
- to cover the face of a certain enemy to feminism whose big doctorate
is in P.E. and who has provided INCREDIBLY valuable advice to
men about how to protect themselves from her own sex, found atop
a grubby toilet,
- to wave, daintily, in farewell to your friends and companions
who you will miss mightily,
- as an ingenious disguise when leaving a small town in Washington
should you find yourself recognized by anyone who has observed
even one glimpse of your near- legendary wedding or holiday (mis)behaviour,
- or just about anything.
- Really.
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March 16th, Two Thousand Five: I was awakened this morning by the sounds of things flying and
smashing, to see my eldest cat -- who is already long deaf, going
blind, and sadly, clearly not long for this world -- had somehow
broken into my bedroom, and was being madly chased round the room
by my dog. Only when I whirled out of bed and put my feet on the
floor, into a pile of broken glass, did I discover what got broken
and where.
My days of late have not been unlike this morning.
I'm leaving for Washington state for a weekish, for Jane's wedding,
and also to see Jhames and Molly and Carolyn, at a minimum. I
think we all know by now I'm not a big fan of travel: I don't
actually mind so much being other places, it's the getting back and forth that drives me
round the bend. I've also long since bypassed my wedding quota
for the year. But not only will it be good to be able to see Jane
and everyone else, me getting out of dodge right now and being
basically incommunicado -- as well as likely having a few nights
alone on a boat -- is a Very Good Thing. One can hope, anyway.
Sometimes, that's all one really can do.
Some facets of my personal/emotional life have had me thrown into
total upheaval. I just feel utterly lost. Most of Monday was spent
a triggered, confused, sobbing mess, a state which had been building
slow and steady, both numb and sharp-edged, for days. It got to
the point where Buddhism be damned, I was verbally assaulting
telemarketers/solicitors calling by yelling "FUCK YOU!" or "SOD
OFF!" into the phone as loudly as I could when they called. I
needed to tell someone to fuck off so badly: I rationalized hurling
it at them simply because they are on the clock and calling here
to bug me. Grotesquely, I find I feel in no way guilty about this.
I've got back my revised manuscript for the book, and even three-hole-punching
it all, organizing it into sections and binders made me dizzy.
Starting to read it just makes me exhausted, anticipating too
many endless battles and conflicts, as well as the maze that is
even figuring out what's been moved where, how to redo and rearrange
a 600+ (single-sided) page document in a couple months' time,
while somehow managing to also keep up with everything else on
my plate. My art and I are also at great odds with one another
right now.
I've noticed sometimes that when I truly feel very isolated or
alone, it's best for me to have time to really BE isolated and
alone, but outside of the space which holds my comforts and my
routines: the way my days always begin, time spent with my piano
daily, my training sessions, my little dog, the home of my apartment
and neighborhood, the people I talk to daily, and so forth. So,
while the days in WA don't have full isolation to offer, at least
a few of my evenings should, and I expect being out on the water
to provide some solace. In my astrological chart, there is not
a single drop of water -- I'm all fire and earth with a smidgen of air -- which
I've always suspected is a big part of the reason I crave it so.
I cannot live even more than a few miles away from a body of water
and feel at ease. I live in the bathtub. When the weather is good
and the water (and time to enjoy it) is available to me, I can
easily swim or float for hours. I am mesmerized, hypnotized, watching
it.
As the hind longs for the streams, so my soul . . .
Dippings. Towellings. The water breathed on.
The water mixed with chrism and oil.
Cruet tinkle. Formal incensation
And the psalmist's outcry taken up with pride:
Day and night my tears have been my bread. ~ Seamus Heaney, Clearances
I'm hoping against hope that by the time I'm back here, a lot
of things will have shaken themselves out, and that I'll myself
be in a better place emotionally, in my head, per my energy. I'll
need to launch full-on into both the revisions and my taxes, I
have a pair of portrait clients in queue, I need to update and
reorganize my portfolio to try and cultivate some showings, and
start pulling together a book proposal for the next one in line.
I need to outline some things for the head of my boxing/martial
arts studio, because I've finally been given the go-ahead not
only on teaching a kids kickboxing class, but also, miraculously,
on starting a women-only self-defense and boxing class (if you're in the Twin Cities area and are interested, please
drop me a line -- if you are interested and are an abuse or assault
survivor, I assure you it will be keyed, beyond the gender stuff,
to be emotionally safe in that regard, and I've always found training
quite healing when it comes to those issues, myself). On top of all of that, I'll need to take care of my heart and
work out some issues, big time. Per the last, I'm mainly just
hoping that time away works some magic, because I'm just exhausted
with feeling so scared and so fragile of late: I'm so tired of
working to change things and feeling like they never really will,
no matter how hard I try, no matter how, every now and then, it
suddenly looks as if they might.
And with that, I'm off running. It's a thrilling day full of laundry
and packing, organizing everything for petsitter and housesitter,
getting the work together I can bring with me, clearing the debris
here as best I can so I can come back to a clear space, figuring
out what comforts I need to/can take with me. My fingers are dulcimer-rusty,
but sitting on the boat alone at night strumming and singing sounds
quite nice. Being anywhere but here right now, heavyhearted as
that makes me feel, sounds quite, if not nice, necessary. |
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March 10th, Two Thousand Five
(more of these, and accompanying text, are up in the subscribers
area) |
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March 8th, Two Thousand Five: So, it's International Women's Day. Which is as fine a day as
any to bring up something that's bugging the hell out of me lately.
Women need one another. All of us. More than too many of us know.
I don't know about you, but I watch a whole lot of women, especially
straight women, turn to whomever it is they're fucking at a given
time, even when they barely know the guy, or when the relationship
isn't all that rich, for support or help in situations when who
they really should be turning to are other women.
After all, that is what we are supposed to be to one another:
community, support, sisters.
Why would you, for instance, seek to talk to a guy -- exclusively,
even, or feel that is the only person you COULD talk to -- for
support with an abortion or a reproductive choice when it's something
only other women can really understand? Why call your guy friends
or casual lovers first to help you move when a woman close to
you is just as capable of helping? Why seek to process your breakup
with a guy with that guy rather than with your women friends?
Why have a boyfriend or a lover provide capital for your woman-owned
business when there are plenty of networks of women out there
who can help you do that? Why have relationships with other women
in which all you really do with one another is bitch or moan about
the men in your lives, or spend time together doing things which
are for the benefit of the men in your lives? Why seek to be radical
in your relationships with men, or with the sex you're having,
but not in your platonic relationships with women?
Let me tell you some of why this stuff deeply distresses me.
It's very important, in my book, that when we have lovers -- of
any gender -- that we aren't having sex, in any way, to solidify
relationships or earn favors. In other words, it's important that
we don't have the funny idea, consciously on unconsciously, that
in order to cultivate support or aid, we've got to be fucking
someone, and that if we are asking for the help or support of
someone we are NOT fucking it is somehow asking for charity. This
is especially vital with women, because the truth of the matter
is that all too often through history, and now still, women have
had to do exactly that: take a lover or a husband to accomplish
what she needed to, or be viewed as a charity case; as some never-fully-grown
daughter everyone needs to take care of because she doesn't have
a man to do what needs doing for her as she should.
As well, when women band together primarily or solely as an escape
from men rather than as a communion with one another, we rob ourselves,
and the community of all the women in this world, blind. Women
-- of any orientation, social or economic strata, what have you
-- have a lot more in common than just men. Our solidarity, our
communion shouldn't be a balm from men, a foil for them or as
an army against them. Our solidarity should be about US.
It's not the fault of women that we remain an oppressed class.
However, it is the fault of women sometimes that we allow ourselves
or the women around us to choose to buy into, support or sustain
aspects of that oppression. It saddens the holy hell out of me,
daily, to see that all too often, a lot of women expend much more
energy to cutting other women down than to holding one another
up. It saddens me that so many women, when they do come to other
women seeking help, do so with the trepidation of beggars at the
door: that they have to go door-knocking in the first place because
the women in their lives haven't already offered the support or
help or community needed and wanted already. (Perhaps because
the mindset they're too used to is that one can justify asking
for help and support when the other person is getting sex, dinner
or childcare in exchange.)
It makes me sad to hear so many grown women still talk about other
women as catty or hysterical or to pick other women apart based
on what they look like: to continue to actively buy into and support
a system which puts women in competition instead of solidarity.
There are days at Scarleteen, reading the young women there dog
other women mercilessly, that I just want to cry, especially when
no matter how you explain how destructive it is, they don't get
it, and don't particularly care to, so convinced are they that
other women are the competition, are the enemy. Almost every day,
we see girls caught up in how to lure a guy away from his girlfriend
because they covet him, with no concern whatsoever for the other
woman in question. Just the other day, I deleted a handful of
posts from one young woman who felt the thing to do that day was
to post a handful of tirades at teen moms calling them stupid
losers. Incessantly we all see endless women never once questioning
that the women in their lives will always, always be set after
the man or men in their lives. Incessantly, when we look at the
cruddy behaviour of young women towards other women, we can see
them as all too perfect a mirror of our own approaches and values:
after all, they don't just learn from popular culture: they also
learn from us, the women in their lives close to them, who have
the capacity to teach them best and have the greatest effect.
Certainly, as women, as feminists, nationally and internationally,
we have huge issues to counter. Certainly, working actively to
protest, to counter, to try and correct aspects of women's oppression
-- issues of economy and agency, sexual violence and sexual autonomy,
reproductive choice, body image, health and the lot -- is incredibly
important and absolutely necessary (and enough women don't do
squat about those things, either).
But without community and solidarity, without really loving other
women and letting them love us, we really can't get there. We're
blocking our own progress in that regard more often than most
of us likely realize. Moreover, without that community and solidarity,
even if we had the rights we don't yet, those rights will only
be of so much use and value, because our lives would still be
missing something completely essential to our freedom and our
hearts.
One of the trickiest things I've come to realize over the years
is that when, as women, we're reluctant to really get close to
other women, even as friends, to really make other women our allies,
it is sometimes because the kind of support and love women give
each other is often just not as easy, as comfortable, as effortless,
as what men might give us. Women often tend to make other women
they love work harder for themselves than many men would have
them do. Women take care of one another differently than women
and men take care of one another. Women often challenge one another
more deeply and more often. Women call one another on their own
self-defeating or shitty behaviour more regularly. Women often
call one another to greater action than men would call them to.
Close relationships between women are in some ways, scarier than
relationships between men and women: relationships with our sisters
are often more challenging, more intense, more volatile than those
with our brothers. Women who feel unaccepted by other women are
often far more hurt by those rebukes than women who feel unaccepted
by men. There are a rare few of us, likely, who don't know that
too well, and for whom many of those rebukes don't linger in their
sting.
That's because it is important, vital, essential that we are allies,
that we are sisters (as outdated as that term may seem, it really
is what we're talking about here), that we create real community,
real support, real solidarity, even just in our own individual
lives.
By all means, do your activist feminist work. Please. But don't
forget about the women you know you're doing it for in the first
place. Nurture community. Cultivate solidarity. Offer support,
and ask for it likewise, openly, freely, without feeling you need
to give anything in return but the same. Love the women in your
life ferociously, and welcome other women into your fold without
reservation. Make it a priority: want those things just as much
as you want to be successful in your work, to find the love of
your life, to feel good about yourself, to change the world.
I will confess that as a biological sister, I've been a horrible
sister for most of my life. I think a big part of that is because
I didn't get much guidance, encouragement or support in being
a good sister to EVERY woman, not from my culture, not from the
people around me. How can I be a real sister to one woman if I
don't know how to be a real sister to any woman, all women? It's
a big lesson to learn, a lifelong lesson, one we should always
be learning. One that I hope I can really have down by the time
this world is done with me, and hopefully, long before that.
One of the greatest gifts the world has given me in the last ten
years or so is a plethora of women who ARE sisters to me, who
offer community, who are inspiring, who are caring, who are fighters,
who are amazing, wonderful women I am blessed to have in my life
in any respect. I have been constantly provided with ever-growing
opportunies to both give and share community with women. The more
open I get to that, the more it all grows, branches out, and it
has been one of the most beautiful parts of my life, one I couldn't
have forseen when I was much younger, or known how very valuable
it would be to me, to all of us. When I visualize the massive
network of women in my life, ever-growing, it is simply amazing
to me.
So, not only today do I want to make a shout out to women step
the fuck up and start learning to be a good sister, a real sister,
with the give and the take, in person, not on paper or with a
yearly cheque to NOW or the FMF, I also want to tell:
Becca, Hanne, Jane, Audra, Sabrina, Elise, Cheryl, Kathleen, Heather,
Clare, Roxane, Debra, Molly, Sy, Jennifer, Joan, Megan, Dru, Michelle,
Kat, Leila, Lauren, Emira, Mandy, Sophia, Noel, Kara, Jen, Lisa,
Anne, Amy, Beth, Danielle, Jill, Tara, Elizabeth, Lise, Betty,
Anne, Cathy, Deidre, Jen, Kelly, Madeline, Laurel, Kythryne, the
wee women in my life -- like Colee, Jane's daughters, and baby
Zoe -- my mother and my own sister
... that I love all of you (and more than I can name here) fiercely,
ferociously, completely and as the sisters you are, no less my
blood than my actual family is. That many of you have taught me
these lessons, and I cannot express how grateful I am for that.
That I'm here for you, always, and that you should never be reluctant
to call on me. When I need to say no, I'm capable of that: I'd
never love you out of obligation, so no worry about owing me anything
if you need or want to ask for help or support. I can't ever promise
always just to mollify, comfort or pat you on the head, I can't
promise not to challenge or anger you sometimes, and I hope you'd
never promise to do same, because as a sister, as an ally, as
someone who loves you as the woman you are and who really is in
your corner, I want to give you more than that and get more than
that in return.
But I can promise to both be your sister and vastly value and
hold incredibly dear that you are mine: to fight for you when
need be, even in the little things, with the same intensity I
bring when I put my boxing gloves on, and that I've no intent
of stopping. I can promise, easily at this point, never to forget
the value of who you are or to close my door to what we can and
do give each other. I can promise to do my very best to love you
the way women all should love one another: wholly, deeply, without
fear or reservation.
I don't know a better way to celebrate women -- and to do what
we can to keep fighting for women, in earnest, for real -- than
that.
Now, get yer ass out there and love, need, experience, enjoy,
admire, support and embrace the hell out of your sisters, sisters. |
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March 4th, Two Thousand Five: It's been an odd week. I think I always say that, in which case,
if it's always an odd week, I suppose it's been perfectly normal,
really. I think I need more coffee.
Within this week -- which isn't even over yet -- I've thus far
had three different people who have needed help processing very
difficult things, or needed some form of comfort from me, two
of whom I met for the first time, one of whom I don't know all
that well. That's okay by me. For some strange reason, it's pretty
much always been the case in my life that people connect with
me the most deeply when they are in pain, are frustrated, or are
in some sort of great process of change. My only issue with a
week with this much of it is that eventually, I do hit a ceiling,
not because providing the comfort, or even distraction tires me
out, but because compassion hurts some. I get angry towards the
people or situations causing others pain, and I'm not very good
at shielding myself from feeling the pain others are in, so there
is a certain level of sadness I start to carry around when a lot
of the people around me at any given time are in pain.
The theme of the week, though, isn't pain. Not even with half
the oral surgery procedure I had done Tuesday, during which the
hygienist wasn't seeming to understand that I have a wicked tolerance
for any sort of drug. I had three novocaine shots in my face,
but with whatever concentration she was using, it may as well
been water, because I was feeling what she was doing, and honey,
it did NOT feel good. In voicing this more than once, my dentist
(who I love more than words can describe) pops his head in, sees
what's going on and states, not quietly, "Heather is not a cheap date. You wanna get her loaded, you gotta
pull out the big guns." I resisted the urge to be honest and explain that, in fact, I
was SO cheap a date that most of the time, it wasn't required
that I be at all loaded to deliver. But that may have been misinterpreted,
especially since both the hygienist may have wondered -- as I
was wondering myself -- how exactly my dentist knew these things
about me in the first place.
Speaking of pain, I'd say that I owe Dante a great big apology
from yesterday, save that from him spacing out during a really
powerful roundhouse kick, I got a bruise in the exact shape of
his shoe on my bicep yesterday. But that was after some woman,
watching us doing a drill (I do apologize to all those who are
not kickboxing geeks), a tip kick-jumping front kick- jab-cross-push-right
and left roundhouse combo, remarked that it was "so cute" how
I was pushing him because he's so big and I'm so "little." I didn't
realize that after hearing that I was shoving him half across
the room like a motherfucker more than a little defensively until
he nearly hit the wall. Oops.
On that note, last week, Dante and I started talking about gearing
my training this year with an eye towards getting me matches in
a year. He was saying six months would suffice, given how long
I've been training up until now, but I think he's kooky nutty
in that assessment. Still not sure if I'll go through with it.
The profound lack of availability of women's matches, for boxing
or kickboxing aside, there's a lot of stuff to think about. for
starters, going into the ring without health insurance would be
complete insanity, so I need that first. I also have to evaluate
how much of a position I'm in to wind up with times when I may
well have something severely fucked up with my face. On a personal
note, I'm not sure I care all that much -- I've dealt with a lot
of injuries in my life, I live with the Frankenhand daily, and
when the dog ate my face last winter, vanity really was the least
of my concerns. Ultimately, how I look should have little to nothing
with the photographic work I do. But boy, even with that dog bite,
some folks were freaking OUT about it last year, so it's more
a matter of how much of other people's worry or investment in
how I look that I'm ready to deal with in this regard that's the
issue. Women's boxing, and especially kickboxing, is EXCEPTIONALLY
brutal. So, I have to even figure if there's a way I could do
this and stay aligned with my own ethics and beliefs per nonviolence.
I also have to really evaluate how I could work this in with everything
else I already have on my rather overflowing plate.
Lots to think about. But, at this point, I can afford to add a
couple extra hours a week to train, and there's never any harm
in that. (She says, after the fear-factor-esque session yesterday,
which involved blocking an endless series of roundhouse kicks
to my HEAD from a 6 foot man, during which I was not supposed
to flinch. Yeah, okay.) I do have a fantastic training partner/trainer:
it's a big bonus for female boxers to have big male trainers who
in a match, they likely could NEVER best, and Dante is very keenly
aware of my strengths (I'm very focused when I'm in my zone, I
have a lot of power, I'm hella flexible, fast and I am not afraid
of being hit) and my weaknesses (my front jab form sucks, flatly,
as do my jumping kicks, I could be in better cardiovascular shape,
I'm sometimes reticent to hit as hard as I could, and I'm not
young at this point) and knows there's no need to be shy about
addressing them. Plus, I do actually really relish competition,
and in my life, I've rarely been afforded opportunities to engage
that in any substantial way, especially not with anything physical.
I still geek out fairly regularly on finally being able to be
a jock in an area of my life and have that supported at all by
anyone. Even one ring match might be a big help with my growing
phobia about being in the spotlight or doing any sort of public
performance. Most of all, I'm just really curious to see if I
can actually do it, even once.
Still speaking of Dante, after training yesterday, we decided
to go by the Bowl and grab a beer. Dante is not a womanizer: he's
been with the same woman for several years, and is very devoted.
But the man's eyes very much like to land on women, pretty much
24/7, and he's not shy about it. Usually, it's not in any sort
of yucky way. But yesterday, I swear he was boring a HOLE through
our server's ass, a woman who I know to be very cool and who likely
wouldn't appreciate it much. I pointed out to him that women DO
generally know when they're being stared at from behind, even
if a man looks away when we turn around. The looking away is generally
useless, and sometimes even adds insult to injury.
"So, what are you saying?" he asks, perplexed.
"We can FEEL it," I say.
"In your ass?" he asks.
"Ummm...." I reply, by not replying at all.
"Like, your ass, it is burning?" he asks, all Haitian-accented,
and truly guileless.
I try and explain that personally, I haven't exactly ever experienced
a feeling of my ass being on fire from being stared at (though
the seat-warmers in Becca's new car have had this effect), but
it's too late. The Burning Ass (as opposed to the Burning Bush)
iconography is already a done deal, as Dante attempts to catch
fire to several other women's backsides with his mere gaze, as
well as mine as we leave, amazed by this previously unknown power.
I give up, man.
(I do have to say, regarding that particular beer-bout and a few
other incidents of late -- as well as many others through my life
-- that it is often a very strange position to be one of the boys
without, in any way, getting the bennie of also being asexual
or sexually uninteresting as far as they're concerned. Feh.)
In other news, no, there have not been any new photo updates recently.
There are a couple reasons for that. One, I've had time booked
with a couple clients lately who did not want work shown publicly.
Fitting them in with the extra ST work has been tough enough as
it is, so even scheduling time to do self-portrait work has been
tricky. Once or twice when I have been in the mood to shoot, something
has gotten in the way: illness, saggy-novocaine-face, a couple
sports injuries that looked icky enough that they would have just
distracted from the pieces. But I have another -- very new and
unfamiliar to me -- issue of late.
I find that right now I don't really want to share myself in a
sexual way publicly. I have been grooving on only doing so privately.
I have just of late had this sincere enjoyment in kinda saving
it all up for in-person, something that basically came at me out
of nowhere. (Of course, this is a totally different topic for
another day, but understand that the primary reason I tend not
to agree to monogamy with people is because while I'm often totally
fine with having one partner at any given time, the fact of the
matter is that the work I do is intimate enough, and sometimes
sexual enough, that in many ways, it is akin to being nonmonogamous,
and people who want very strict monogamy tend to find in time
my work bothers them in that regard.) Suffice it to say that it's
not exactly easy for me at this point in time to experience new
things sexually, for the most part. I have a few cherries left,
and of course, things are always new with a new person, but when
something that feels almost entriely new crops up, you bet your
bum I want to check it out, explore it, find out what it's all
about because...well, it's neat to feel new. And I'm sure I'll
figure out some middle ground soon enough per work, though, so
I'm not caring overmuch about any downside of that right now.
Eh, screw the theme. Things seem more complex than usual lately,
with a whole lot going on at once, all of it varying greatly,
and plenty of it just not being for public consumption. There's
some more heavy stuff that's gone on this week --issues that have
cropped up about S/M, about gender issues, about active and interpersonal
feminism, about reproductive rights and about men having any stake
in a woman's uterus, among other things -- but I'm not sure how
to talk about it, especially since some of it isn't exactly my
stuff to discuss. Most of that is really the stuff of more objective
nonfiction, and I've a mind to get cracking on a little of that
next week. Oddly enough, what's heavy and complex isn't actually
my own stuff at all: I've been, per just myself, incredibly perky
and optimistic lately. What's on my virtual turntable is usually
pretty telling to my mood. A buncha weeks back, the endless fount
of Aimee Mann became downright dangerous: the last couple weeks,
it's been almost nothing but Jazz Butcher, Me First and the Gimme
Gimmes, Los Amigos Invisibles, the Detroit Cobras, Cocteau Twins
and a bunch of REALLY incriminating guilty pleasures I am simply
NOT sharing here. Point is, the sort of head-shaking going on
of late is often the kind that goes with the bouncing feet, not
with the bouncing bottle of vodka.
This weekend looks to be happily mellow from this point (so long
as nothing goes wrong with anyone else around me). All I've got
on the agenda is training, housekeeping, a little paperwork, a
little photo work, and a date Saturday in which dart-tossing,
veggie-dog and tater tot eating, gift-gauntleting and potentially
some delightful rolling around making the tasty noises are the
order of the day.
Now, if THAT is all that happens, I think I can actually be justified
in calling it odd.
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February 28rd, Two Thousand Five: (Yeah, me, still insanely busy. So, you get new artwork finished
in lieu of a prose entry. Not entirely thrilled with the scan
quality, but such is life. For the record, these pieces should
by no means be interpreted as how I am feeling right now. Rather, they're part of the ongoing series where I am investigating
relationship dynamics I've experienced during a lot of my life
as a whole.
P.S. Whoever the powers that be are who are finding it amusing
to have every recent relationship or romantic/sexual state of
being with Jhames and myself running eerily parallel? Either knock
it off -- it's just getting creepy -- or let one of us run the
stuff slightly ahead of the other so we don't have to be clueless
at the same time, wouldja? Thanks. ) |
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