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Sexist Me

21 Tuesday Nov 2017

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In 1984, at the age of sixteen, I heard about female genital mutilation.  I was horrified and angry, but I had nowhere to share this information or how I felt, no way to make a change. People at home were too busy fighting, and everyone at school was all about everything you can imagine going on in high school. Horrified, angry, and helpless make for flinty bedfellows. I internalized and built me a case for hating men.

In 1991, five years after I graduated from high school, Anita Hill testified that Clarence Thomas, supreme court nominee, sexually harassed her.  I thought she was brave for coming forward, I believed her, and after he was confirmed my hatred for men accelerated.  How could anyone let this pig become a judge?  (Side note: I didn’t even understand at the time that he would be a judge for a lifetime and what that meant, or how his wife’s politicking everyone ignores.)

Four years later, 1995,  I married my best friend. My high school years and many after did nothing to help me learn and grow into becoming the best person I could be. I was a man-hating woman hell-bent ready to punish everyone and everything who brutalized women. I. Won’t. Be. Your. Victim. Anymore!!!   Those years were tumultuous, years without a strong support system. I hated men less because my husband was kind, but the lurking vigilante shadow was never far away, and I did little to banish it.

In 1998 my son was an infant, and I was enmeshed in the daily life of being wife and mother.  I kept up with the news in a fairly background noise kind of way.  I heard that Clinton was being accused and dragged to court and impeached for lying under oath. Well that was stupid, Bill, what the hell were you thinking?  I heard the woman he was with was a willing, if not eager, partner, and I gave him a pass.  What?   Yes.  I gave him a pass.  He seemed like a charming dude, really good on camera whether it was an address or a spot on a talk show.  I mean, how could a dude who seemed so decent (yes, he had a dalliance and he’s all humbled by it) be the predator these other women and politicians made him out to be?  I felt like the women coming forward were the unfortunate victims of those who had a political axe to grind.  I felt like, if Hillary stood by him, why shouldn’t I?  I gave Bill Clinton a Democratic pass because he favored the same things I did, he was charming, and I was not paying attention to the deeper, more relevant, issues.

Twenty-eight years after I graduated high school, 2014, I found myself in the lobby of a hospital waiting to visit my son.  I picked up a copy of Vanity Fair which I don’t normally read, but this issue caught my attention.  I read about Monica Lewinsky’s life after the scandal.  The focus of the article was humiliation and bullying. 2014 was a pivotal time for me in so many ways, and this article was part of it.  Ms. Lewinsky describes her life after the scandal and her hopes for what women need to do going forward.  Monica had been a throwaway for me. She was a willing participant in an affair, so what, let’s move on. After reading the article I learned how wrong I was.

In October of 2016 I became enraged and sickened by the words of a president-elect caught on tape. I looked forward to his sad-faced confession and withdrawal from the race, but that did not happen.  People did not seem to care that he admitted to groping women without their consent, enjoying it without fear of retribution because when you’re famous you can get away with it.  The Narcissist-in-Chief is our president, and I mourn every day.

It is November 2017 and I am questioning everything I know about myself as a woman and everything I believed right up until this day.  Three women accused Bill Clinton of rape or misconduct. No one cared. Sixteen women came forward to describe being abused by Trump before his inauguration. No one cared.  Harvey Weinstein was exposed, a tap was opened and it appears the floodgates are breached. Every day more women and men are coming forward to share stories of their abuse by the famous and the unknown.  As I sit back in amazement at the revelations I cannot help but look at myself for being complicit.  I gave Bill Clinton a Democratic pass, ignoring the women he abused. Should I give that same treatment to Al Franken because his sins were not that big a deal? Why turn my back on Roy Moore but not Charlie Rose?

The harder we put men’s bad behavior under the microscope, the harder I take a look at myself, the closer I listen to my internal tape recorder. I am shocked by what I find. I read a female journalist’s book and in several places I felt annoyed and frustrated that she was complaining about her hair, or her choice to give up her relationship and comfortable life in exchange for face-time on air covering a presidential candidate. I heard my inner voice saying to the cashier where I buy groceries, “Geez, lady, would it kill you to smile?”  I am sexist just like all the rest, but at least now I know it and I am willing to work hard to do better. I no longer want to exercise vigilante justice under the cover of my superpower, invisibility.  I know now that knowledge is power, and so is my voice. I have to stand up and speak out equally for what is right, instead of giving a pass to the folks I kinda like because they’re cute or funny on a talk-show.  Justice looks so different to me now. I hope my voice will add geometrically and make a real, lasting change.  I pray for equal vision, equal treatment, and an open heart and mind always.

What Does Your Flag Remember?

13 Sunday Aug 2017

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Quickly! Quickly Betsy, fast as ever you can, we need to see each other from a long way. Make the flag of canvas or cotton or linen, use everything you can, but we must carry our message into the field and beyond when we’ve taken out those lobsterbacks!

Quickly! Quickly, Constance, as fast as ever you can, we need to see each other from a long way. Make the flag of canvas or cotton, linen or silk, use whatever is at hand, but we must carry our standard into the field so the Yanks know we’ve forced their retreat, our message clear!

Ah. Ackh. This flag tastes like ghost pepper, my eyes and nose and mouth are thick and throbbing.  That’s all right. No biggie. Sliding this flag off this stick 1-2-3 and you’re mine now, pathetic, race-hating antifa motherfuckers!

Ah. Ackh. This flag tastes like ghost pepper, my eyes and nose and mouth are thick. That’s all right. No biggie. My friends will douse me down with water. We got some good Go-Pro footage of everybody hollering and jeering, until they decided it was time to come and get us. Now? My flag tastes like salt and blood and I dunno what. The flag isn’t really the thing, it’s more like, standing up for what’s right.

Maybe they’ll remember Heather’s name or maybe she’ll have some 15 minutes of fame in her deceased state, you know, walking along a street wanting to stand against bigotry and white nationalism. I don’t know whose face or what place to mark that she was here. Seems like we all have to make our mark, somehow, something that says we were here. We did something. It meant something. We want our times and times and times to remember what we stood for. The little girl of me wants to remember the best of us.

What does your time, your greasy fingered baby-back rib in the front of a cave mark, stand for? Was it peace? Did you stand for neutrality to escape getting your ribs cracked because you took a stand? Or did you lick your fingers clean?

(the women’s march on dc included very specific instructions that we were not allowed to carry signs, banners, or anything sharp or cudgel-like, and we followed that rule. we carried lots of 8 x 10 inch paper, cloth, pillowcases, hats, shirts, lots of people walking to and from the mall with one goal in mind, and that goal was not to stand behind a shield, and beat you with a stick or throw bottles filled with urine or cement. why was that rule not in place in charlottesville? i await the governors reply)

We smear meanings on the wall, things we want to remember, things we teach our young. Something happened here, and smear that moment on your face so you know you are part of it. Your cannon mates, your tent mates, the buttons on your tunic, that bit of cloth that tells us where to rally, or retreat, and did you understand what it all really meant?

Flags, unholy acrid, captured and desecrated. Flags damp in the dew of morning on the way to capturing you.  Flags rising up, defying a surrendered past, denying defeat and demanding glory, wanting to tell its silken story to a crowd that sits restless in chains or brings its thin pole down and down and down upon you, race-traitor.

We will remember you, in your place as we savor gobbets of meat from the fire.

I Marched Because (I’m gonna need a bigger boat)

24 Tuesday Jan 2017

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I do not believe that life begins at conception

I believe that abortion should be safe, legal, and accessible

I believe that sex education at home and at school can prevent unwanted pregnancy. Teach your daughter, teach your son, with facts, not myths, and threatening to throw them out of the house if they wind up pregnant does no one any good

I believe that a menopausal woman, married those long years to an abusive man, shouldn’t have to bear him another child if she does not want to

I marched to support Planned Parenthood who provides healthcare for women in need of exams, education, and assisting with birth control

I believe that a woman’s right to choose may be eradicated by the current administration

I believe you do not have to use birth control or have an abortion if you do not want, but do not take that right away from those who do

I believe there are children who need to be adopted, and our adoption laws and services need to be updated to protect the adoptive parents

You believe a zygote is more sacred and more important than eradicating poverty, but once that child is born, the mother better not get on welfare

I marched because

You believe that women and blacks can work and vote, therefore our country is equal and undivided

I marched for the LGBTQ community who have yet to be treated decently and equally

I marched for Gamergate (women who spoke against violence against women in video games who were in turn threatened with rape and death)

I marched because Brock Turner raped a woman behind a dumpster and served three months instead of 6 to 14 years. Had he been non-Caucasian his sentence would have been longer

I marched because “rape culture” are words commonly used in sentences

I marched for the populations who do not have clean water, access to health care, and genital mutilation is still practiced

I marched for Trayvon Martin and Philandro Castile

I marched for Black Lives Matter, and I hope you’ll not suggest that I don’t care about or appreciate Blue Lives, or any of our men and women in uniform

I marched against normalizing “locker room talk” so our children know that assault is not, and never will be, the status quo

I marched for Malala, Megyn Kelly, and against mansplaining

I marched against painting immigrants as rapists, terrorists, and bad hombres

I marched against a man who mocked a disabled person then lied about it

I marched because Citizens United takes the voice away from The People in governmental affairs and no one seems interested in overturning it

I marched because I know a wall won’t stop people from seeking a safe haven from their countries’ oppressive regimes

Because I know that as long as people want drugs, or want children for sex or to clean their homes, no wall will stem the flow

Because citizens choose between their meds or groceries every month

Because our veterans are forgotten while they are still living

I marched because we turned a blind eye to lead in the water, plastic bottles and bags have become a need, and we are destroying earth’s balance of water and air

Because school-to-prison has become the norm

I marched because there are people who believe the Sandy Hook massacre was a “false flag event” and if you do not know what that means, please find out and search your heart

I marched because there are too many guns on the street killing our young people

I marched because we are not one nation under God—we are not all believers–but we are good people who pay our taxes just the same

I marched because individuals, corporations, and religious groups do not pay their fair share in taxes, so  the middle class shoulders the burden without the benefit of an account in the Caymans

I marched because going to college should not create lifelong debt

I marched because I believe in a well-rounded education, not just the ability to pass a test

I marched because men think it’s okay to catcall and follow women walking on the street like it’s an acceptable means to have a conversation

I marched because women who are wise and stand up for what is right are labeled as witches or worse. We are ridiculed because we’ve “already got everything,” what more do we want?

I didn’t march because I want to rip a fetus from a womb because I hate babies and want to eat them in a stew, or emasculate men by forcing them to be more like women. I didn’t march to ask we get rid of all guns.  I didn’t march because I hate white people or God or my country.  I marched because I am asking you to make room for other people’s beliefs and needs.  I am asking you to get your head out of the television and Twitter and wrap your head around the fact that the United States is part of one small world, and we have to share it. I marched to ask that you understand your bible doesn’t apply to us all, but as long as we keep loving and talking to each other, we are going to be okay.   Look deeply into and drink the words love, respect, and tolerance. Let go of fear.

We have come to a place where people don’t want things to change because that’s the way it’s always been, that anything else will offend God, or it will lead to the extinction of their class and race.  That somehow all good traditions and values will cease to exist once they die.  I am asking people to examine if it’s fair to force all of us to live by your views. The world is going to go on after I am gone, and I want to leave it a more just and fair place than where I found it.  I feel grateful to have learned that life is not and never will be “my way or the highway.”  Can you learn that, too?

Women’s March on Washington (summary)

24 Tuesday Jan 2017

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The Woman’s March on Washington was touch and go for me for a long time. I wanted to participate but didn’t want to go alone, as I am not a big fan of the subway.  Sounds kind of wimpy, but truth is truth.  I rolled the Facebook dice and asked for a ride. A kind lady replied.  We talked on the phone for a bit and made sketchy plans. My instincts told me by her views, past work history, and being a grandma hitching a ride and crashing in her hotel room would be just fine.  And it was.  I even asked my Omaha companion to vouch for me as a safe travel mate, and I’m pretty sure he didn’t tell her we talked about robbing liquor stores.

She and her cute little mop dog picked me up at 4:30 AM.  We stopped in Alexandria, Virginia to pick up breakfast at an amazing bakery, dropped off her dog, and a friend took us to the Metro station. From that moment on, it was nothing but pink pussycat hats, t-shirts, and posters everywhere.  Amazing.  The Metro was packed from boob to clear backpack. I eavesdropped on them all, where they came from, why they were marching, interested in their age groups and what they did for a living.  The station where we planned to disembark was apparently overloaded, so they dropped us off at the next one.  It was early, so more walking wasn’t a big deal.  We freed ourselves from the squeeze of the subway car and shuffled towards the escalator that led up to the street. I saw many posters with Carrie Fisher or Princess Leia above the word “RESIST.”  As the escalator brought us up to the street the one on the opposite side carried National Guardsmen down into the Metro.  A loud burst of shouting “YAY” and clapping broke out for them. I felt proud.

Once on the sidewalk, it was easy to figure out which way to go.  Just follow all those people walking down the middle of the street.  Hundreds of us, all going thattaway, police directing the sparse bit of cars that wanted to get through intersections.  I heard so many people thank the police and National Guardsmen and felt glad.

The day before was the inauguration, so many Portajohns were put in place for the crowds to relieve themselves.  Most of them were padlocked the following day, the day of our march. Finding a place to pee meant watching the marchers go by while we stood in line, but sometimes you just have to put your sign down and answer the call of nature no matter how long it takes.

Arriving on the Mall and seeing the Lincoln memorial down one way and Washington monument the other, its point obscured in the fog, was very exciting.  We made it!  We ambled the same way everyone else ambled, reading signs, listening to the chanting that broke out every now and then.  The plan was to meet up near the rally point.  We left the Mall and tried to make our way towards the rally, or at least near the jumbotron but it was a dead end.  We were behind the Native American Museum with nowhere to go, but more and more people kept coming up behind us, and I could see it wasn’t going to stop. Roars broke out from stem and it waved and roared and roared all the way to stern, and I’d never seen or heard anything like that before. I’ve been in some pretty big concert crowds wearing other people’s sweat, my arms pinned and being moved, feet off the ground, by the movement of excited people. There is nothing like being part of a group who is there for the same reason, the same happiness and excitement.   It can be fun, exhilarating, but also dangerous.  I told my march buddy I felt uncomfortable and I wanted to get back to the Mall before we got so jammed up we wouldn’t be able to breathe. We turned and went upstream of the unending salmon and eventually made it back to the Mall. There we were able to read amazing signs and take note of everyone’s creativity.  A marching band came down dressed head to toe in white with black lines made to look like a wall, and they were awesome.  Some folks banged drums in time with their slogans.  Many times I felt close to tears because of the solidarity and creativity of everyone who came.

I saw a small group of pro-life people but they were being drowned out, surrounded by everyone else who did not share their view. I wanted to throw them the middle finger, it would have been so easy, I am such an angry woman, but I realized that would bring me down to their level. We walked by observing silence.

Me and my marching partner found a small restaurant where we ate and watched the news. The march wasn’t exactly cancelled, but it was definitely log jammed and rerouted because there were too many people to convey onto the original route.  Wow!   Upon seeing the crowd from above we both agreed we wanted to get out of Dodge before everybody decided to get on the Metro.  We finished eating and hopped the next train.

I didn’t get to hear any of the speakers (oh but we heard the roar while we were there), but I believe, based on what was reported, many of those people did not represent me. I have my own reasons for being a body on the Mall, filled with pink hats and good behavior.  I will never forget that day, my 49th birthday, and will always be grateful for a lady who took a chance on letting me hitch a ride. My reasons for marching will be on the next post.

Let’s Keep Talking

23 Monday Jan 2017

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On the way out to my car I met a man who works in my building.  Typically we smile or nod or wave a little hello but have never exchanged as much as a word.  This afternoon as I’m locking my door, I nod and said, “How’s it going?”

“What the hell’s going on?” he said which startled me a little. I started to ask if he was okay, but then he filled in the rest. “This crazy guy is a president now, and I just don’t know what’s going to happen!”  He was very sincere in his concern, and I felt him, oh boy did I feel him.  He had a lot to say about the inauguration, and I listened to him even though I could feel the grocery list burning a little hole in my pocket.  His need to communicate was more important, though, so I prepared to listen for as long as it took.  At the end of his sharing, I told him, “Look.  As long as you keep talking to me, I keep talking to you, we are all going to be okay.”  He seemed to understand what I was getting at, but it didn’t change the pained expression on his face, his head shaking.   We talked back and forth a little bit longer, then waved off and went our separate ways.

I’ve been thinking about that moment ever since.  I hope that all of us will keep talking to each other, we keep hearing each other, and uphold what is decent, right, and good for the good of us all.

More to follow.

Peace Begins With Compromise

13 Tuesday Dec 2016

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I don’t like to be pigeonholed or slapped with some final label that “defines”me.  I am of a mixed mindset, philosophy, and that is right and good.  Maybe some people can carry a sign for just one “thing” at a rally but my sign is too big for the Goodyear blimp, a CNN chryon, or just about anything else. At this point, my sign will eeeee-clipse Mount Rushmore.  How can I carry that complicated thing? So I blog and hope my body will suffice.

Why does my sign have to be an 8″ x 10″ on soft paper?  Yes, the world can change on a small piece of soft paper like our wonderful Constitution, but the voice, need, desire, and the right of revolution because the world changes deserves a voice that breaks mountains! Some folks say the media is stoking a racial divide, or there is a shadowy faction that wants to control the world first by stoking a race war, taking guns away, and who knows what else.  Suddenly women want too much, including not wanting to be pregnant for whatever reason.  My country wants to live in the past, the past of biblical, conservative “democracy”, and it’s so hard for me to realize that we all have to make room for each other but nobody wants to.   Tonight I want the pro-lifers and the pro-choicers to make room for each other.  I want to see two people who love each other so much to make a union, and raise children in a home filled with love, but I want there to be a place for people who don’t see it that way to have a voice, too. I want the gun owners to know we’re not trying to take all the guns away, but damn, man, whatchoo need that overflowing magazine for, unless you’re in a double war zone? I don’t need you to justify to me your beliefs, but what I really want is for you to make space for mine, because it’s my right. I want women to be paid equally, I want black and brown people to not be profiled, and I want us to figure out how to fix our criminal justice system. How is that unAmerican and wrong?

What the hell is America if we can’t be a place where we aren’t all singing the same song?  What the hell are we about if we can’t stand up for each other’s values or take a knee when we disagree?  Why the hell can’t we disagree but still get along?  Respect each other’s views, be a land of discourse instead of blame?  You don’t want to marry a woman, fine. You don’t want an abortion, fine.  You believe government should be smaller and not be so concerned with world politics, fine.  But what about the rest of us who don’t agree with your view?  Why can’t you make room for us?  Will your whole world only be right and at peace because your government looks like your bible?  Or maybe the fear that the whole world will collapse because you held on to your beliefs while letting others live their own lives?    What about the rest of us who would like to live in harmony with you?  It’s only a “war” if you label and market and perpetuate it so.  What about the freedom of discourse?  I guess unless it doesn’t provide a sexy soundbite and break down the facts it’s just better off ignored, life is just all right? Meme ain’t democracy, babes, but I respect the hell out of your right to express it.  I only wish we’d only get on the same fact page.

I hope that someday we can all get over this whole religious/government order thing and just figure out that this whole world is right small, and how lucky we are to have clean water to drink.   We’ve only got limited water and air and we’ve got to share it.  Our views don’t have to agree with yours, but can’t you just live with the fact that the whole world doesn’t have to agree with and live by your mores? Is there no space in your world for people who don’t agree with you?

I will march to DC in January not because I hate men or life or the Electoral College. I will march not because I want to create divide between black, brown, and white, male and female or because I hate babies.   I will not march because I hate all guns and their owners.  I will march because of EVERYTHING.  For all my beliefs, for the right, the sacred right we have to even march and stand for what we believe.  I will march because I believe in an America that has different beliefs that should be protected, and does not stamp out the opposition based on religion. I will march because I am a woman with beliefs who look different from yours, asking that you make space for mine. I will march because we’ve only got one tiny world and we have to get along in it.

Thank you for listening.