"If lovin' you is wrong, I don't wanna be right"

ok, my beef today is with the blessed concept (grossly misutilized term, to be more accurate) of being "Real". Capital R for a Reason, here.

I'm watching yet another Reality show (problematic in its own right, I realize! but onwards...), with the morbid curiousity in me awakened anew. At least two people per half hour in any random Reality shoo define themselves as being Real. One yells it out antagonistically at another person, "Hey, I'm just being real! If you can't handle it, it aint my problem!" Another one spouts something about "I'm just keeping it real"..while backing away from committing to any true opinion for herself, instead preaching a cliche to stand in as a Postcard version of the truth unspoken.

What probes my irritated bowel is that using this term is like a free pass to be a royal bitch, or a mean person, or be brutally blunt and go around slinging shit in the airwaves, not worried about where it will land, as long as it's instrumental in hurting people's feelings somehow. It's hypocritical as hell too, a bit like saying, "I'm not one to pass judgement..BUT..." before lunging into a REALLY judgemental diatribe. Uh-huh.. riiiiight. So being Real is about being rude, insensitive, not relegating yourself to using communication skills (you know, Big Girl words) or investing in a little self-knowledge ("Gee. Am I being an unreasonable, insecure person?"), choosing instead to yell or intimidate others, parading around like a giant angry cock swinging at anything standing in its way. "Look out- you're gonna get swiped!"

In that case, let me remain here UN-real in my NeverNeverland of niceness and spare others my Realness. Real, you say? more like really crass, really selfish, really offensive, really petty, and really desperate for any semblance of power*. (*Interestingly, power-trippy types tend to throw this coy little term around like salt on hot, buttery corn).

I propose that what this Really reflects is a national pathology of misguided hostility (ie. road-rage, anyone?) and pedestrian, equestrian (?!), misconceptions about Strength and Power, which can manifest as mismanaged anger (ie. the kind little kids use when they spit at other little kids in the playground), and not healthy aggression (ie. the kind adults use to win the race, or to sue each other's asses, diplomatically). To use aggression correctly is to be able to identify the problem, its true source, how it affects you, and where to direct it to achieve resolution. This is very different than getting all tangled up in the helplessness and frustration of (unidentified) anger. To harness aggression is to make the best of this energy, to propel action and resolution through Righteous Rage, applying this force beyond the means of "survival" (ie. caveman days), and leveraging it towards creativity, passion, drive and other juicy, generally productive things! Being "Real" just don't cut it when it gives license to spout shit outward while remaining ignorant of one's insecurities, and pathologies, etc.

Welcome to the Un-Cola kids - thanks to the boob tube - the facade, the Un-real is being marketed, paraded, and sold to us like it was fresh lemonade on a hot day in July. "This is the new Cool!"

Don't buy it, and don't drink it. This kind of Real don't mean much relative to the origins of the word "real", you know the one with NO capital "R".

werd.

From the Dept. of "Give Me a F* Break"

"Nothing is wrong with you. This is only a dress rehearsal, life is only a test."

It is when everything down to laziness is pathologized. "He's not being an asshole, he has attention-deficit-cheap-bastard syndrome or ADCBS!" It's good to bring attention and awareness to real problems (ie. learning disabilities) but if every time a guy cheats on his wife someone turns around covering him with a shroud of dysfunction ("he is a Sexa-holic") I have to throw my hands up (well, more like throw up..a little bit...in my mouth. but I digress) and ask the gods, "What the fuck?" (rhetorical. still my favourite kind of question). Tiger Woods, or Edwards, or Jesse James (and whoever else is the flavour of the Cheater's Month) is now attending oh-shit-they-caught-my-ass-and-now-I-have-to-do-damage-control-by-prenteding-to-go-to REHAB! (or OSTCMAANIHTDDCBPTGTR). oi to the fucken vey. (as my proverbially extended eyelashes flutter like an exotic bird's for dramatic...em-pha-SIS.)

anyhoo. today I received an unrelated (and belated response) from an ex-date in which he asked if I liked his "new profile". He is possibly trying to 'chum' me up. Yes, well I liked your old one, enough to go out with you. Um, now after rudely rejecting me you are asking if I like the new one...FOR ATTRACTING OTHER PEOPLE, other than me. To that I have to say, "Are you dead inside?". Oh, but no. That is too harsh. Let me guess. It is not this person's fault. He is merely suffering from "I can't believe-the-world-doesn't-revolve-around-my-dick syndrome", or ICBTWDRAMDS.

Forgive them, Father, they know not what they do. The same goes for every time I sit on my ass feeling sorry for myself (instead of productively blogging! :) I am merely a victim of Pathetico-misinformio-misis-POF syndrome*. (*acquired from the POF dating site). Puleeze. Buy some fucken Accountability. I'll have my accountant draw up some charts for you.

ha well, I needed a larff. Might as well get a cheap one here.

Because when it's illegal to harm others, humour can be a wonderful substitute.

ponderances...

does what feels like shit now (having people 'close doors' on me, while I try to remain open, and friendly, receptive to new friendships and more, protecting and honing the old ones, etc.) going to turn into 'dodging' a bullet of sorts later, I wonder?

Am I being spared certain pains for later, or certain wrong roads to have taken - had these um, tenuous relationships-in-the-make evolved to any fruition?

Makes me wonder. What are the Significators here? Is there a grand significance to underscore these incidents? How do these facts of significance tie in relationship to who I am, where I want to go, and / or who I am meant to be?

also, alternately, makes me ponder if I am looking for a way to lessen the pain and irrationality, randomness, and the feeling of helplessness and frustration from it all...or if I am being insightful on deeper levels.

methinks, as usual, both. I am a Libra.
I have seen the face of Uranus, my Venus is rising, as is my Ire.

what to do with such Ire rising? ;)

more to ponder: how to use It to best advantage, how to move forward, how to become stronger from it, and through it.

Incommunicado: the New Age of Dating?

I think the social experiment has gone horribly awry.

My attempt at 'dating' online (that is, starting there to end in actual life) has been disillusioning at best, and depressing at worst. Actually the "best" and "worst" lines are no longer that far from one another, nor even mutually exclusive!

Thus far, I have made efforts and connections (hard won, harder found) and conscientiously entered into each connection with openness, energy and enthusiasm as, apparently, have my cohorts (in the beginning anyway). Men are terribly interested in learning about me! They read my profile, they write I am pretty, amusing, clever, bad, sexy, kooky, Other; they want more pictures; they want a link to my blog (ha), they want to know if I am on Facebook; they mail me letters, await mine in return, put in efforts in clever replies, (as do I), they want to chat, or phone, or just get to the coffee thing. It's all positive, fun, respectful and seems like a great cosmic, kismetic, momentum-building exercise in hope. (No one is admitting how goal-oriented this exercise is, but that is ok!). It all seems so promising!

Then they meet me in person. (or...worse, in one particularly notorious incidence of abuses against my heart). The world continues to spin on its axis but something has drastically shifted in the inner cosmos.

To the onlooker, the date seems to go fine, my daters are chatty, animated, clever, attractive. But post-meeting they stop writing almost immediately. They are 'offline' in the chatter programs, yet start to openly peruse through the dating site (online) there. In short, they drop the ball. I am in the courtyard alone, still hoping to get another go at the game, still looking to kick it around a bit. Now there is a sudden sharp pain, a Craw in my (proverbial) side.

This Craw is: Why would prospective daters unceremoniously and absolutely 'drop the ball' like that? Well, I have a theory (or two):

A) because there is always Plenty of Fish, always another bus coming around the corner, always someone else who might be prettier, more clever, younger, sexier, richer, slimmer, taller, smokier, dirtier, cooler, sportier, blonder, artier, cleaner, different. There is always someone "better" out there. "This one's not exactly what I had in mind.." (loin? mind?) so they throw the fish back in, and keep looking elsewhere. Nary a moment exists for a thought that maybe, just maybe that Perfect Little Gal, that Dreamgirl who has it ALL (at immediate glance) is a myth: she may be gorgeous, you may have amazing 'chemistry' right off the bat, but that same chemistry may not hold if there is nothing else of substance to keep things interesting later. That hot girl you want to screw (supposedly "assessed in the first 3 seconds of the date..") well, you may be looking at your next Ex-girlfriend.

B) the Chemistry misnomer. Is this the only way to locate a prospective Love? by looking for Chemisty (read = heat) right away? Am I missing something here, because that sounds and looks an awful lot not like looking for love, but looking for Lust and settling for lust! hey, I like lust! Lust is good. I've been down that road and it starts off great, and has a great middle and an amazing climax (o, the humour is still there, lurking) but the ending..oh-how-badly-that-can-go!! It goes downhill and picks up speed if two people have not bothered to prop up the relationship by other means. I would like to think love can be found after the second or even third date if there are other potentialities and angles to scout!

C) No one really ponders the (unpopular) patient-laboured notion of Investing something! Investing...Time for example: anyone can become attractive to us the more time we spend wth them and get to know them, engage with their personality, hear what else they've got to say, understand where they are coming from, see where they want to go, laugh at their jokes. Why do you think there are so many office romances among co-workers? Cause they see each other nearly everyday. Hello? repetition, familiarity can breed closeness and attraction! There is more to see than the first 15 seconds of "is she, or isn't she (The One)?" My goodness, what a fast-food driving, insta-date, just-add-water, spoiled, I want what I want NOW, fucked up society we are quickly becoming! Those flings that started at lust, and moved to a careless, makeshift form of 'dating' always led me to the crossroads of Getting Hurt and Asshole.

I wonder, in these seemingly-hostile, rough dating waters where people are conceived of as 'fish' (expendable, as well as being abundant) through the misconception of habitating in a big, endless ocean - does anyone really stand a fair chance? There is a finite number of fish, and the real ocean itself is very finite and fragile in its own way (being polluted, and exploited beyond maximum capacitity by greedy bastards. And yes, we can all be greedy bastards). The same 'logic' holds true for cyberspace: there are no rules, no lines, no boundaries, hence, less personal accountability. Nobody exists until you see their "icon"! It's dating in a vaccuum.

What foolish, fallible creatures we seem when we are so ready to believe in myths, rather than understanding ourselves by accessing our inner knowledge, and questioning our expectations, what's Ideal, where these ideas have COME from, etc. in order to better understand and appreciate others. How do WE appear to others in the world? What are WE bringing to the 'table'? How are WE accountable for our dating situation? How can WE improve ourselves, first and foremost? Maybe not-so-rhetorical questions we should be asking ourselves next time we plan to meet an attractive stranger that we might be projecting all sorts of shite onto.

walking contradiction

here is my blatant rip-off of the Morissette's "Hand in Pocket" whilst freeflowing poetrizin'


Seem drunk but I'm sober
I'm smart but I'm fun
Sound flat but I'm bumpy...baby

calm but I'm restless
Shy so I'm bold
nice but I'm naughty...baby

Light but a Dark horse
cute but I'm overdressed
Sweet but I'm spicy..baby!

what it all comes down to-o..
is that everybody's mostly full of shit!
I've got one hand in my pocket
and the other is flippin a ..hello!

I'm contra in diction
I'm left but I'm right
(anyone smart would know that!)
great yet SO humble!
smooth but a bumble-ler
watch as I tumble..baby!

what it all comes down to my friends, yeah
is that silence is the answer most giv-e-n
one is giving you the finger
when you hear crickets in the dark...

yep. what it all comes down to my friends, yeah-m
is that no one's got it figured out just yet
they keep putting off replying, now I'm lying in
doggie shit.


peace. out.

Where is my Elliot Garfield?

maybe Mother Fate has an ironic sense of humour...or has other things in store for me. While my social life may be thriving, whenever I get remotely interested in someone (and, it appears mutual at least!) some odd occurance sharply severs the tie just like that! Poof!! all gone. not gonna happen. I am seeing a pattern here. "Not yet! Not yet! oh, oh...oh, this one..looks like...maybe...OH-no, Not yet!!" (sucka.)

Maybe I should set my sights on something more realistic and attainable. Maybe I should focus on becoming famous this year! Why the hell not?! I've never gone for this goal, and it's about time I tried something just 'wacky' enough! haha wouldn't that be f* great?? (rhetorical question, no need to get excited about an actual 'answer').

Theoretically, if I cannot muster an interesting coffee companion in say, the next 2 weeks, I will throw caution to the wind, career-wise, do the counter-intuitive thing (which, if I really break it down, is actually the true, correct and INTUITIVE thing I have had boring a little hole in my jacket pocket near the vest [heart] all along) and go for the Gold and act my little butt off! social convention, timing, sense and reason be damned! ;)

Maybe I may even meet my own Elliot Garfield in some dark theatre hall with a silly little hat atop his head, dressed as a pirate. za-wooee! now that would be poetic.

Girls will be Boys

So I'm listening to Bowie's "Boys Keep Swinging'" walking around the mall, heavy sack of Stuff slung over one shoulder. I am looking to replace a cell phone (and an excuse to trade UP into an iPhone or Blackberry, truth be told!) and as I look around me I think: I cannot wait to gtf outta this mall. This lone thought would quash any stereotypes about girls who love going shopping or partaking in 'retail therapy'. Not me! I want to get what I need, get the cheapest version (of passable quality of course) of the Thing I need, and get OUT as quickly as possible! and there are signs all over the place, signage for everything, "water, water everywhere but not a drop to..." understand wtf they are all stating..! And all these pretty Things, and displays and clothes just keep getting in the way of seeing those signs clearly, especially the ones marked "Exit"!

I'm not antisocial- far from it- but the mall and people in it all seem to gravitate toward fallin' or leanin' on me, brushing their bags and backpacks against my personhood (!), or stepping right in front of my path exactly onto the spot I am about to step into. So I wind up doing a little waltz, half a dosey-do and curtsey about a dozen times along a single corridor. But hellz bellz, all that bouncing and cajoling, is throwing me offa my game, and I am the hunter seeking what I need- on a mission and NOT to be confounded by these so-called- Wants! Finally my mind can't handle all the collisions, shiny things, bouncing bags, and dosey-doeing making it oh-so-much-easier to mentally check-out and into a fuzzy fantasy world with bad musak where rose coloured lenses depict pretty things as not being Costly, no sir! only as investments to be MADE..."Things that will make my life BETTER-er!" There is merit to having and purchasing Things, of course. I should know, I have plenty of them! But I hate Shopping, the recreational pastime, the stereotypical hall of female bonding, or the 'retail therapy'. It aint too therapeutic cracking open your VISA bill and having stark realities squelch your eyes and squeeze your heart a might.. Therapy? I think NOT. More like Crisis Management! Collateral Intervention!

The only type of shopping I do enjoy, oddly enough is for food (go figure). In this way, my anti-shoppping stance might be labelled by some traditionalists as being more 'manly' and less 'girly', I suppose. But I shrug at that, and think "I pity the fool who thinks such stupifying, arrested and dichotomous thoughts. I pity the fool!!" (MR. T style)

I also like to fix things. Got a problem? Ask me! (mind you, my specialty is of the social or emotional kind- am I Handy in that dept!) But if all you want to go is marinate in the same old drudgery and misery and whine about the same issue you have done nothing about since the last time we 'talked* (*meaning= the last time you whined using a different angle, and different words...you clever thing, you;), then I am not interested. Tell me about a problem you are having, I will listen intently. Then I will put in my two cents of how to help you! I want to help you in earnest, especially if it sounds like a sucky time for you. Sorry, I guess I am thinking like a 'man' again! Do you really want to do something about it, or am I just a pretty sounding board? I think you are sounding bored, myself...

Another little chink in my armour, I hate being 'coy' based on some gendered expectation of 'proper' behaviour. If I like a guy I will probably want to do something about it in time. I might want to do stuff with him, or kiss him or better! :)) I don't want to play hard to get, or act aloof to get him to 'chase' me. Life is short, man and it's getting shorter after 35, so either pee or get off the pot! (god, I am feeling colloquial and colourful tonight! hoo-aahh!!) I don't want to be chased, nor chaste! Am I thinking like a man, because I want to do the same stuff that you, boy, want to do? Nope. I am thinking just like me.

I want to be authentic, and act based upon my own feelings about the world, and I know it's up to me to figure out which messages are genuinely mine, and not someone else's, that is my cross (your heart bra) to bear. I like pink and pink is only a colour, yet it is loaded with meaning based on what our culture has projected on it, via socialization, symbolism, language and institutionization. Everything is coded. What would Noam Chomsky say about the lexicon of language and our codes and their purpose and subjectivities..? that is perhaps another rant in the making..

Still, why is yellow the only supposed gender neutral colour for a baby room?? Why not make pink the new gender-neutral colour? Why not imprint and encode, re-code messages over the no-longer-relevant or less non-productive ones? I would like to think, that if I were a guy I could like pink without having to resort to justifying it as being 'salmon-coloured'. cough* cough*

As we stumble into each other at crowded malls trying to be happy, buying cool stuff to feel good, we are all mirroring one another, by embodying endless dynamic combinations of Yin/Yang, and light/dark and blood/water, male/female, the Moon the Sun--and everything in between...and it is usually IN-BETWEENS where we really 'live, if you ask me.

The bigger question begs, "why are there no f* cell phones on sale anywhere?"

"Should I stay or should I go now?"

Ahh, decisions, decisions...
the most painfully chronic has of late been the what-the-fuck-am-I-supposed-to-do-in-the-dating-world kind.

I try to live with integrity -as much as I can- when it comes time to sharing with people I like and care about. With friends I want to feel that I am really with them and honour their prescence, as I hope they do mine. I want to share of myself and also listen, through a natural ebb and flow, so to let moments 'occur'. So...why doens't this concept extend to the Dating world? do the Rules suddenly change there?

For me there is a sense of "should I feel something...or should I not"? When is it 'safe' to FEEL when one is starting to date? After all, if one is to be in the presence of someone to try and get to know them, isn't it right to be 'present' emotionally as well? To laugh when something is funny, to smile when there is something endearing, to blush when there is something blush-worthy. But Jeebus H. C. BillyBobThorntonWilder, what happens if you like a guy?? That's a NO-NO! just BADDDD news!! But why?? It confuses the shit out of me. (ok, I'm tired, I'm slinging out dirty colloquialisms. I pronounce tonight "Freeform Sweary night"!)

I feel like I am expected to be passionate one minute (or in certain scenarios), then dispassionate and emotionally 'detached' the next. Internally flicking an invisible On and Off switch just in case 'they', the TM's (Timid Men) don't want to get closer or you know, actually feel icky things..like feelings and stuff. I am to Keep Disengaged and coyly come out only IF and when there are clear and distinct indications that he is feeling positively about me. Oh. Joy. (Why don't I just go and charge the vibe batts now..)

But why is it up to TM's? Why are these men the proverbial deers-in-headlights, easily-spooked, emotionally fragile creatures, darting off into the forest at the merest whisper of feelings? How and why do THEY get to wield so much power with respect to issuing the "green light" relationship-wise? What does a 'green light' look like these days anyway?? "Hey, I could maybe fuck you again." "how R U doin" (thru the texting* medium), or "Wow, you parallel park pretty good...for a girl." Huh?? this shiz be-confu-fuddles the f*ck outta me!

It is easy to keep a cool head if one is 'not that into' the dude (no, not the Lebowski ~we loves him~), but it becomes a messy string of turns if one should actually become (gulp) innerested in a person. The Rules state I have to play hide the heart while he tries to play hide the sausage...or something like that. But the point is to hide something from the other. Thing is: I hate hiding, suck at poker, wear my fuckin heart on my sleeve most of the time, and have a hard time unplugging my Bullshit Detector. It is always ON! It is my downfall, it is my greatest ally. I Curse the Skies! (in dramatic fashion a la Charlton Heston circa first Apes movie) "Damn you, Bullshit Detector, damn you for cajoling me into being real and earnest, even when I bloody know I oughtn't be! Damn. you. to HELL..!" (and.........Scene.)

Maybe that is part of my problem. Maybe I AM too earnest. But is it really so bad to say to someone, "Hey, I like you. Do you want to hang out again?" Yet suddenly this blockade is erected, an underworld of emotional and sexual politics comes to the fore, where truths are veiled, details spun and distorted, and behaviour altered and manipulated, in order to Keep the Upper Hand! God forbid you become vulnerable, and say, "(gulp) golly, Beav, I guess kind of like you too. Ok, let's hang out." Why was this easy when I was 22? But now, are the stakes higher the higher the number..?

After a string of one-night-stands-that-looked-and-sure-sounded-like-they-were-meant-to-be-more faltered, I did the math and realized they had all died Harakiri style immediately upon me starting to Trust (aha- tsk* tsk*) that the other person may have meant what he said. Examples: "I definitely want to see you again," "no, I WILL call you," "Sure, we can hang out again.", "Let's just keep trying to connect." (And some, if I really admit it, were nowhere romantic to begin with, the post-coitus having been met with a limp-handed, grazing handshake some eye-avoidance and a mumble like "ok, 'night." WTF. Literally?)

I don't know how the hell I am supposed to be Present, or Real, or Open to feeling 'Feelings', while at the same time aiming to protect my heart so much from terrible rejection and regret. Is this not a contradiction in nature? How do you reconcile being a passionate, feeling person and keeping cool and emotionally detached in games of the heart? How can I date without engaging my heart?? Isn't that the whole POINT of the exercise? oy to the f*cken vey.

Today, I am trying to keep my uh, expectations in check, and by "in check" I mean non-existent. "Don't expect courtesy, kindness, honesty, or reciprocated admiration, or the courage to be real with you, Missy! But don't forget to act surprised IF and when they drop you a text bomb to invite you to tea!" Now, Sit up, stick your tongue out, and pant quickly! (oh, how cute! Girls are SO cute, when they deny themselves the full spectrum of the human experience! :))


These heart/head games suck because they dampen any joy, contentment, or the tiny blush that threatens to keep my mind entertained for days on 'afterward'. It sucks because somehow I must repress ANY inklings of happiness "just in case" I am to be met with horrible impending rejection. "Don't even bother feeling excited about the prospect of anything promising, gurl. Just get to a poundcake now and unplug the phone. Uhm-hum."

Honestly, the "stay or go" game is such an emotional rollercoaster, that I feel like bowing out completely, and going to projectile v. somewhere nearby. I sometimes wish my spirit DIDN'T strive for hope, truth or that elusive thing..romantic happiness! Things would be SOO much easier without the want of it! "Damn you, Spirit! Damn. You. To. Hell..!"

For me the Feeling stuff comes easy, but this despondent and detached shit- now THAT is hard.

setting sights and aiming...

losing a job to a 15 min. break? damn right I did!

I remember one particular cold fall when as a student I got a PT job at the local mall. This particular kid-centered retail outlet...ahem* had a certain professional tendency to hire young female things who would not mind nor balk at there not being a 15 min. built into their 4 hr (and sometimes longer!) shift. Well, along came I, somewhat more jaded as I clambered into my 30's with my 'been-there-and-dun-that-and-I-sure-as-shit-don't-wanna-go-there-again 'tude. Upon my first real shift, I was informed that (insert co. name) does "not really do that" in reference to my query of when my break would occur. I was dumbfounded...but not dumb. So I insisted and claimed some psychosomatically-embellished condition impacting the weariness of my feet and compounding my thirst (I believe...) until the manager finally relented.

I "took" those 15 mins, boy, like it was the first taste of ice cream for a prisoner who had been locked away in a dungeon bereft of the flavours of food and left with scarcely any water for sustenance. I TOOK that fuckin 15! If I could have had sex with it, I would have.

In fact, my irritation and pull for subversiveness propelled me to 'make a point' by not-so-subtely taking, that's right...over 17 minutes (SUCH a radical!).

Then I was met with a lecture, er, I mean a rather involved discussion with the manager whereupon I argued for the virtues and benefits of giving us peons a short break and how it would overall improve productivity (trying the money angle, having assessed they were not the least bit receptive to any human rights angle), whilst she proceeded to explain to me how she blew the female president's cock on an nightly basis, administering to her every whim, including parting her hair to the exact follicle, holding it back upon fluid exhalations into a porcelain bowl or wiping the phlegm from under her (snide) nose, anything in order to 'protect the company assets'. Jaysus H, who are you kidding?! you are protecting your own ASS-ets so that by sucking every 'authoritative' proverbial cock (I said it again, it bears repeating!) you can remain with your foot solidly in managerial peon mode, carefully cemented into the landscape of the company's mosuleum for years to come. Well, do whatchu gotta do, sistah! and to each her own!

I get it, the co. wants to save money! Duh! but this is NORTH AMERICA, where presumably we are among the more fortunate when it comes to worker's rights where the min wage is shit, but it is still better than an assembly line Honduran worker's min wage, and where a 15 min break is a RIGHT not a privilege to be bestowed upon the hearty many who intend to complete their 4 hr. shift. Aint it...??

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...mgr. and I spent over 20 minutes going back and forth (diplomatically, I will attest and give props to) but nevertheless, "wasting" the company's precious time instead of being fruitful and letting little New Peon enjoy her 15, then come back refreshed and pumped up, ready to perform to the public how she cares about kiddy clothes, rarin' to help young parents get the right toddler pants size! That's the way to get geared up right, right? All it would take is a certain amount of dignity, respect afforded to the worker, to acknowledge her as a human with needs like water, food and yes, the ever, grossly under-valued concept in our society: REST!

No, my foot is not broken (nor sprained), no, I am not internally bleeding, not I do not need to "run" to the washroom, no I don't "feel ill". I do not need nor want a legitimizing excuse. I wish we did not have to feel guilty or ashamed without justifying a respite, or rationalizing it in some small, semi-apologetic way. Remnants of shame are so deeply woven into our collective fabric of consciousness, creating concepts like 'being idle'. Well, I do not speak in 'idle' terms nor laziness, nor weakness. I reject these terms and claim my respite because I am a human being and not a robot. PERIOD. full stop. No shame nor stigma need be attached.

Why the big deal? you ask. It's just a 15 min break! Because it's about taking our space, it's about seeing ourselves as worthy of space and having needs and considering the human aspect of the worker, the rights inherent to all workers the world over.

I am taking a break for those who may never get one, for those who deserve one too, for those whose voices are stunted, or forcibly quieted, for those who fear retribution of job loss or those who feel threatened or alienated. It is about claiming our power as people back. You can't rob me of my humanity, Big Fucking Corporation, Big Fuckin Governmental Body, Big Fuckin Institution (applying such discourse to make it 'ok' to devalue the human, and attach shame to rights we ought to claim). I don't give a shit if this year's aim is to 'tighten' things by squeezing everybody else's waist. You don't own me, you rent my time and labour, RENT it, while I hold my end of the contract to uphold your rules, and do my assigned tasks to the best of my abilities. So why aren't you holding your end up of the bargain up to respect me as a human being, as a critical part (not merely a peon) in this money-making, mass-producing system called capitalism. I don't like the deal one bit.

I WANT MY FUCKIN 15 MINUTES.



(NOTE: this author would call in 2 days later and resign from this unfortunate post, feeling that staying there would perpetuate all those things about injustice and mis-use of power that make her feel sick in her heart, and feelings of anger and shame that make her sick in her belly. Above all, she was humbled and thankful she could 'quit' a job, any job.)

It's a small gesture of resistance, but the personal can't help but be political. We need to look beyond the price tag to the lines between the stitching...where there are nameless, faceless workers often bereft of their rights and dignity as human beings.

Please, Mum - let's not shop here.

"Fear Not Want Not, Want/on woman"

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

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

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 harder

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 model...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

eye candy. just because.

"If you like it and you want it...put a ring on it" ?!

hm-humm. Foh real, Beyonce?? Oh, puleeze, this is a old and misguided a concept as the (albeit way cuter and niavely spunkier, 90's version of new 'feminism') Spice Girl's "girl power". This thrusting black and white video shocking my tv airwaves is not empowering in the least, but only riveting for its sexual provocativeness (and yes, catchy up-tempo), guised as female power but aimed clearly at and for the "male gaze". I sigh.

B (can I call you, "B" Beyonce?), are you trying to sell, I mean, tell me that waaay too high-cut leotards, undulating buttock movements, multiple half-naked limbs and girating thighs sausaged into shimmery tight stockings - aggressively thrust in tandem with a "marry me" anthem - is empowering to me somehow? How so? All I see are a lot of legs and asses practically eye fucking with the camera's lens and accompanying words like "if you like it and you want it, put a ring on it". Not helping is the fact that the song drones on and on in that ever-original way of beating one good riff to death via a musical hazing. Oh dear, oh dear.

What exactly is the "it" you are referring to in this ode to the women's movement? the "it" that he wants/likes? is it your talent? your mind? your philanthropic heart? your multiple million dollar homes..? personality? um, what is this "it"?? 'cause I gotta tell ya, all I see (repeated without end in sight- pardon the pun) is ASS. A whole lot of it.
B. girl, you are selling your ass. For a fucking ring.

Problem #1 your imagery is fucked up. It is the stuff of the juvenile, breast-fixated, hyper-feminizing, Barbie-humping, panty-hose fetishisin', defensively hetero MALE GAZE. Sure, these women look hot...but they also come across as cheap because they are selling everything- at once, and in a BIG WAY (buy 1, get one free, these goods won't keep forever you know)! Displaying all the goods up front (and in the back), presumably aimed to inspire tenting in boys and men's pants throughout the continent. Problem is there is no subtlety, no nuance, no come-hitherness, no...well, sex appeal! Women are flesh robots shaking body parts and not saying much beyond 'asserting' that they need a ring! I think there is some cloudiness as to what is sexy, what it could be, and WHY people are alluring to begin with. But here, what you see...is pretty much what you will 'get'...tonight...if and when you flash her some bling! ;)

Problem #2- what kind of the message is being sent here (esp to the young 'uns - male or female)? If you are really liked by your guy, the only sure way to tell is if he buys or somehow "acquires" some gargantuan rock for your digits. WHAT?? What if you love yourself and are lucky enough to find a cool guy who also loves you, but no rock? This video and the song's (and I use this term loosely "lyrics") would indicate that strutting in high heels singing about deserving a ring from your man is the way to be on top, an alpha female, a winner, the powerful woman! But let's not kid ourselves- it is still the man in control here, he's the one to buy and bestow said ring onto her...if he 'likes' her enough. What about her 'holding out' until she gets that ring then? Is that her taking her power? Nah, it just boils down to sexual blackmail, which is selling the self short again, thus disempowering to women. Hollah!

What if you like the cock but aint getting- or even wanting- any rock?? Are you some kind of 'failed' femininity? Ya almost delivered but stopped just shy of aquiring real success as a truly desirable and desired woman. hm. As a single woman sans rock, paper or scissors, I resent this. I don't feel the least bit failed, unsexy or incapable of inspiring devoted love from a partner. I don't think one ought to be validated by antiquated norms which prescribe a materialist token of 'commitment' like buying an expensive, processed precious metal. Jewerly is nice and I'm a romantic, but this notion of forced consumerism tied to love and/or commitment is absolutelty UN-romantic to me! Because it is expected, it is therefore feigned.

Problem #3- I hate the aggressiveness of this style of 'sexy' dancing. there is nothing sexy or sensual about it at all! is there..?? (crickets) Show them how it's done Shakira (a la "it's in the curve of my hips, the line of my smile..." Phenomenal woman style)! A little hip, a provocative look here, a little shimmy there goes a long way and feels way less forced and desperate than the Britneys or Beyonces violent jutting of hips and legs with sullen faces. Isn't there another way to sell "sexy" other than using hyper-masculinized movements, alpha dog style?? I'm not saying women can't or should not move aggressively but I think this way of sexying it up this way stifling and culturally 'blueprinted' onto us as a kind of sexual-raging-by-the-numbers. Don't we have our OWN voice, physicalities, can't we package our own femininities to reshape our own language of movement, of sensuality..? With such vast complexities and variations within the term 'woman' so is there plenty of space to be explored yet.

Problem #4- the song is catchy to toddlers on YouTube and people who move on auto pilot to a catchy chorus. It's catchy, but where is the art in this song? Any remnant of a song never stood a chance once it gets lost in over-production consisting of the same masturbatory four chords and setting the 'record needle' on repeat for roughly 4 minutes. Was it ever meant to be, well, good? "Not necessarily" you say? Well, hellz bells then, I should write me something! Let's see: "My humps, my humps...my lovely lady lumps..." oh shit, that's been done. DAMN it! (Dear reader, be glad I know when I ought not to pollute the waters of an already-polluted world of musical mediocrety!)

Ladies, sistahs, if you like 'it', that is if you like yourselves, don't buy a line of bull about how showing your boobs for a "Girls Gone Wild" video or shaking your ass cheeks in CU in some hip hop video is an expression of your power. It is only predicated on one aspect of your full range of power: your sexual power. Yes, it is a big issue, but it is not ALL. The downside is this overfocussing on sexuality and prowess can obscure and make obsolete OTHER aspects of feminine power! the mind, the physicality, the learned, the inspired, the emotional, and on and on. These are other components of our 'power' that the MTV generation is not going to be privy to anytime soon. Seems a pity that a dampening of the full experience of female identity is hugely mainstreamed and reifyed through mediums like this to become not only socially accepted and but also expected. ugh.

One last note on this night's late rant...if he does like "it", don't let a silly little ring do the talking, the loving or the very real work that makes for a relationship. The ring aint the thing! that's fairytale stuff. Give me a man who'll give me a kiss and a coffee, then cheerfully do the dishes in the morning (yes, in that order)! Now that I can take to the bank!

If he really wants to please you, he should put a ring on it alright: a well-fitted cock ring. Long-lasting good times abound, am I right? ;) Why not let HIM do some shaking and shimmying and see if I still like him!
tee hee

sheesh. another sad one...

Patrick Sawyze died today. He succumbed to pancreatic cancer at 57 years young. Sad. He seemed a sweet person and was a beautiful man.

I hope he is in peace.

I will watch Point Break or To Wong Foo so I can remember some of the joy he brought us.

donchu hate it when

aacckk....! I had some thoughts earlier.....

They were. interesting.

I forgot them.

fuck.

I feel a bit sad. again. and again.

I asked a street person if he was hungry. He said he was. I was coming back from Safeway and the booze store carrying several bags and felt my 'abundance' irrespective of him. Two yogurts and a danish later, he made a point to look me in the eye to say an earnest "Thank you." I could not muster "You're welcome" at first. I think I choked something out under muffled breath without meeting his eyes. I tried to gloss it over like it was no big deal, it is just food shared from one to another, no thanks need be given. In his eyes I caught a sadness, sensitivity, a young man, a sweet person. Yet, my Privilege hung like a great mustard bomb in the air, a heaviness that goes unmentioned yet which its perpetual sting is felt ominipresently. The weight of this supposed 'Priviledge' felt like a pit in my belly, a thick queasiness. That word clung in my mind as I walked back to my 'car', and headed to my 'home' housed in warmth and light, reflecting to me the stark inequalities between his world and mine (not 'ours'). And it hurt to see someone be so fuckin thankful for what should be the basest of needs met. Food. Kindness. Respect. For another human being. It should come so easily...

I pushed off repellent thoughts of feeling 'blessed' to have helped someone as some kind of saviour. Those make me embarrassed at my own benevolent narcissism. We are capable of so many things, yet human beings are best at instilling vast differences in access to resources, eroding the measures of quality of a kinder, gentler life, great blatant and nuanced inequality among people. This young guy is not the first person I have ever given food to. What bothers me most is it is not 'my' food by virtue of my having consumed it in a monetary transaction, but our food that if were distributed rightly, would and ought to be his food as well. He got it via another channel, from a caring passerby this time. Why must he ask a stranger in the first place?

I always remember the hungry ones who looked so touched or grateful at my meager offerings, who too looked me in the eye to say a thanks. I saw part of their dignity expressed in that gaze. I wanted to acknowledge the young man by seeing him, the person in his eyes and accepting his thanks. Yet, in that gaze I could hardly utter a "you're welcome" through the heaviness clutching my throat. My silence keeps the swelling pain in the heart obscured. For a moment, at least. Then I move along.

it's not so much the badd gramer...

I think I feel slightly embarassed because of her naivete (yeah, you grammar gods, but too lazy to look for the character ;) and perhaps because I am not sure if she was intending to write a scathingly ironic piece...er, or if her compelling sense of persuasion ends up making her look a bit...foolish. Either way, girlfriend... eesh! (shaking head. someday she will show this to the grandkids and have a larf. I hope.)
We all f*ck up sometime!

to my Zapatista (brothers, sisters)...a small moment of solidarity at least

FIRST GLOBAL FESTIVAL OF DIGNIFIED RAGE
WITH THE THEME OF: ANOTHER WORLD, ANOTHER PATH: BELOW AND TO THE LEFT
TO BE CELEBRATED ON THE FOLLOWING PLACES AND DATES
THE OTHER MEXICO CITY, FEDERAL DISTRICT, December 26, 27, 28, and 29, 2008. IN LIENZO CHARRO OF THE ASSOCIATION LOS CHARROS REYES DE IZTAPALAPA, Frente Popular Francisco Villa Independiente-UNOPII, Avenue Guelatao # 50, Colonia Álvaro Obregón, Delegación Iztapalapa, close to the metro station Guelatao, where an exposition will be presented. AND IN THE HEADQUARTERS OF UNÍOS, Dr. Carmona y Valle street #32, colonia Doctores, close to the metro station Cuauhtemoc, where other activities will be held.
THE CITY OF SAN CRISTÓBAL DE LAS CASAS, CHIAPAS, IN CIDECI, located on the Camino Real de San Juan Chamula s/n, Colonia Nueva Maravilla.

SOME OF THE SUBTHEMES OF THE FESTIVAL WILL BE:
AN OTHER COUNTRYSIDE
AN OTHER POLITICSAN OTHER CITY
AN OTHER SOCIAL MOVEMENT
AN OTHER COMMUNICATION
AN OTHER HISTORY
AN OTHER ART
AN OTHER CULTURE
AN OTHER SEXUALITY

THE FESTIVAL “ANOTHER WORLD, ANOTHER PATH: BELOW AND TO THE LEFT” WILL HAVE THE FOLLOWING CHARACTERISTICS:
1. In Mexico City, a national and international exposition will be installed where every struggle, every experience, every rage, will have a space where it can set up and show its struggle and its courage. This way we can all see, hear, and know each other.
2. In zapatista territory, dignity and rage will become art and culture, music and song, because rebellion also dances. And with words, pain will become hope.
3. In San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, the word will go back and forth in order to give birth to new words and give strength and reason to rage.
4. The national and international groups, collectives, and organizations that participate in the festival will be only those who are invited to do so. To this end, the Sixth Commission of the EZLN has initiated consultations with political and social organizations, as well as with groups and collectives of anarchists, libertarians, alternative communication workers, human rights defenders, sexworkers, intellectuals, social activists, ex political prisoners, all adherents of the Sixth Declaration; and with groups, collectives, and organizations of other countries, all part of the Zezta Internazional. The criteria for invitations and participations will be made after these consultations.
5. For the roundtables, the EZLN will invite social organizers, thinkers, and leaders of anticapitalist projects from Mexico and around the world. The list of invitees will be released later.
6. More details about what we are thinking the festival of dignified rage could be will be made known at earliest convenience (that is, when we have an approximate idea of the problem we have gotten ourselves into).
That’s all for now.

LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ATENCO!
From the mountains of the Mexican Southeast. For the Indigenous Revolutionary Clandestine Committee—General Command, of the Zapatista Army for National Liberation.
Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos.Mexico, September of 2008.

haughtiness

the wheel turns. I know this one.

so, I've been accused of being a...wit. Some have even alluded to me being more a wit to the "t", if you know wot I mean. And so I had me a think today: so what is my response to being accused of such controversies, of being suspected of such tomfoolery and less nobility, less solidity of character? Well, I don't like it when someone *mistakes* my playfulness for 'immaturity' (I have heard such utterances, now haven't I?). Nay, I care not for such misdirected attributes. Any more than one can address the issue of me stating notes in the clipped, yet dulcet tones of an older era, as I do now, can they explain why I joke when I do, and to whom and why! I will nonetheless, try.

Ok, so for the "short bus" (yes, terrible lack of PC'ness there, I know, I am fully acknowling it, but onwards...), since back to the 8th grade I have had my er, sense of humour thrown back proverbially into my face (so to speak), with people misunderstanding my character or dismissing me for a clown. Were they wrong?? (well. no. not exactly...) What they did not realize is that while I was (am) a jokester, I did not do it out of yang to "fit in" or to amuse or muster quick attention, I did it fluidly and naturally more out of the selfish urge to amuse MYSELF really! Things looked funny to me, I had an imagination and perceived odd pictures and quickly accessed the grotesque potential in the amplified levels of the truth...and I could witness, in a moment, such absurdity! and words sounded like others and could be toyed with, for hilarity! it was too easy..! yet, hard to resist. Perhaps I should have tried to..? Perhaps I over-did it.

Perhaps I continue to. Let that be my downfall. Many will not 'get' it, may not like me, (such fools...tsk*), may dismiss me again by not peering beneath my veneer of good humour and lightness. I suppose I am to blame for that, when I do not explain that having a sense of humour about things in general has helped me cling to hope through some dark times, had made my mother laugh until she shakes, has made my brother's cheeks tighen in a loud guffaw, has made a good party kinda better, has brought strangers to me as quick friends, has made me feel the hope a child feels by its purity, its innocense, has amused my friend until tears form. I have willingly stepped into the role of court jester, for her birthday, knowing that laughter makes her happy, pleasing her is an act of love for a friend. I have done so for others. Sometimes a kind word. Sometimes a lil joke.

I like to make people feel happy. But greater to that effect, I think I like to make ME feel happy. There are too many hours to account for laden with much anxiety, panic, fear, sadness, loneliness, self-loathing, insecurity, torment, and on and on... I have seen so many days like those. And once I was very, very sick and very, very sad...and I met myself on the way out, in a moment of mourning. I saw my youth and health vanishing and my face changed, my heart lost its hope, my spirit lost its innocense...a great part of me died then. I thought I must get out of this great pain. and I must use my will and my spirit as a way to get out!

(Well, I will spare you the details, dear reader, but I did get out.) Helped mightily by great Intention set in my mind, along with the ole perseverance that made me flip over the tree branch over and over one summer, until I could do that sommersault (!), plus a healthy dose of skepticism, and fueling this ride, was my Spirit. In it lived playfulness, humour, a childlike *thing* if you will, but whatever it is, it has served me well. And so I grew out of. I grew up into. I continue to.

Now that I am (more) grown up and seen past my serious teens and my politically correct 20's...to see that "growing up" should be about being happy, making yourself as happy as you can. Being true to your spirit, whoever you REALLY are (not who you've been told we are supposed to be, not who you think you might have been). It's about using the tools you've been given. Me...?? well, I like to think about things, and I like to play. The play has been good to me. And forgive me if I am bold, but I daresay I have witnessed a smile, a chuckle, small grins to those around me when I too share with them as they share their gifts with me. (I learned about sharing in kindergarden, got a A, did I ;)

I can say this without thinking of it as boast: Yes, I am a clown, but I am also a dreamer, a child, a wise woman, a teacher, a healer, a poet, a lech, an adventuress, a fighter, a (gentle) rogue, a chameleon...that lets me change my robe.

If you want to get all colloquial on me- "well, I've got one hand in my pocket and another one is showin' you how to perch and rotate!" I may look like an apple, but look a little closer, coz I am a pomegranite.

eind if ye don't like it, mate...(honki-ty, honk, honk)!