Thursday, December 18, 2014

"Fear Not/Want Not, Wanton Woman"

I first posted this in 2009 - after coming out of school.. but I think it still stands very much relevant to what I feel today.

I was scared I would be heard
so I began to sing

I was scared to be visible
so I let my Light shine again

I was scared others would hurt me
so I came to love them

I was scared no one would love me
so I learned to love myself

I was scared I would not make friends
so I started liking others

I was scared others would think me sensitive
so I let myself cry

I was scared people would only see a clown
when they saw me...so I played more

I was scared to Shine
so I learned to breathe, and to Let it be

I was scared I had no direction
so I followed the path in front of me

I was scared to be rejected
so I auditioned/applied for it anyway

I was scared my body was no longer beautiful
so I dared to dance...onstage...in lingerie!

I was scared to be found and get hurt again
so I went public on interweb and said, Here I am!

I am not Fearless
such claims I do not make
but I have come to know
that Boldness is the flip side of Fear
the choice is there I have pushed through

as I choose to stand in spite of fear
so I stand in Love for me

Sunday, December 14, 2014

What's Your Story, Morning Glory?

So while killing time on set a male colleague off-handedly turned to me and asked, "So...what's your story? Are you married? Got a boyfriend...what?"

"So, we are starting there, are we?" I thought. Having caught wind of this person's rather unwelcome M.O. around other women on set (he was becoming notorious for making sexist or sexually suggestive comments). Women were initially broached as objects of conquest, secondly as colleagues, it would appear.

Smart retorts quickly flooded my mind but I resisted, being mindful that spewing something out would be hostile. Perhaps I didn't need to be defensive if his angle was not to offend (at least, not intentionally). In the few seconds it took to think on how this comment was intended, I asked myself that question: What WAS my story?

My "story" didn't really start where his started, nor circumference itself around relationships in my life. It operated on a different levels, across various fields and scopes which had very little to do with whom I was romantically entangled with. In short, my story did not subscribe to this rather traditional, patriarchal (and heteronormative) paradigms but rather sat outside these confines to be its own wild animal, its own running horse, unfettered and free of the constraints of societal expectations whenever possible. I chose to be the writer of my story, not just its recorder. 

What was my story comprised of? What factors in my life had created my story and shaped me as its favourite protagonist?

My mind, heart and spirit all have long grocery lists of influences on identity, including my own temperament and brain, as well as many horrid and or 'challenging' things, wonderful things, excruciatingly painful things, character-building lessons, inconveniences, humilities, perceptions, joys, loves, defining moments, risks taken, roads less travelled and many inward quests...the likes of which only another "Quixote"-ian dreamer/lover/fighter might understand (where we are both battle weary from charging at windmills a time or two). If I was a conquistador of my sordid little tale, I knew not its end, but only its rough beginning and a middle I was now immersed in.

What those "who are you?" identity questions posited around my relationships to male figures are really asking is, 'To whom do you belong?'. Not too surprisingly, this ideology harkens back to when Marriage (the institution, with a capital M) was more a contract, or exchange between the initial proprietor of the female (the Father/Guardian) and her newest owner (the Husband) and less a love story* (nowhere are Ryan O'Neal or Ali McGraw featured*). Starting one's story from the pinnacle point of one's romantic partnership does not have the same sweet ring as say, "So...how do you define yourself in relationship to others, the world and most of all, yourself?" Now THERE would be a juicy question indeed.

We run into a bit of identity-erasing danger when the "married/not married", "single/not single" is the initial ruler from which to splay out a woman's identity. It's fantastic to be Mrs. X, but I would like Mrs. X to also be asked, "What ELSE about you and your life, your experience, your spirit, your passions, your knowledge, your travails makes you, you?" Black or White, This or That-type dichotomies are too small a space from which to see a full picture, the breadth and scope of an identity. I would need to chew my arm off to wriggle out of such a steel-jawed contraptions to liberate myself in all manner, in order to remain a free thinker, paradigm-buster, and self-defining individual that I am endeavoring to be!

I may look like an apple, Sir, but I am a pomegranate, composed of many tiny planets. We all are. Clueless Colleague meant no harm, I'm sure, but we seemed to be speaking across at each other from different islands and nary a boat in between. How to bridge such a divide?

I decided the best way to answer his question was to be truthful. My truth was not only different, but also bigger than his truth. Of course, I didn't expect him to know any of it, having barely met me, so I thought it best to just inform him.

"What's my story?" I took a breath. "Well, I am an actor, a writer, an artist, an explorer of life, a friend, a social creature. I am doing props, kitchen help and set dec, and am learning about indie film first-hand, which is awesome. I have an interesting story, lots of them actually! But my Story doesn't gravitate around men nor is defined by my relationships to them. I don't see things that way. My story stands apart, all on its own. I am the sum of all my experiences, and lessons and perceptions." Then I smiled in earnest, and stuffed my hands back in my pockets. (It was cold.)

Another male colleague who was standing close to me had heard the conversation. I glanced sideways to see he had a small smirk on his face.  

The inquisitor of the initial Question looked at me for a moment trying to gauge if I was being 'bitchy', hostile or had gone slightly mad. The confusion was because I was none of these things. After a moment, he mumbled something or other then stepped away. My male friend and I exchanged a look. I was glad I had a cohort, the kind of man I could befriend, the kind who was on the 'same page' regarding women's stories. He got it.

I'll bet he has his own richly woven story. A tapestry from which his relationship to a partner, may be a part of, but not all encompassing, nor defining of his whole identity. After all, we are all pomegranites.