Straight No Chaser

I had the dream again. Two nights ago.

Its always the same.

I stand on an outcropping at the side of a waterfall, 2/3 the way up the watercourse. The stream tumbles over the the rim of the canyon like an old man falling out of bed.

Only it isn't a stream. Its a boulder. A granite boulder, big as a pickup truck.

It drops, drops, drops through the empty. It roars past me, in wild, perfect, silence.

It drops, drops, drops, into the empty. Just as its about to pass out of sight, it strikes another boulder and shatters to smithereens. There is no sound. It explodes in wild, perfect, silence.

The rocky shards fly out in every direction. They rise to me, glittering, tumbling, razoring through the underbrush that lines the watercourse.

They slash towards me and I raise my arms in front of my face, bracing for the stroke that will flay me to ribbons.

But before they reach me, the shards turn into swallows. They wheel away in order and disorder. They fly up to their lodges on the canyon rim.

I hear them in their muddy lodges. They chitter and chatter, cuffing their chicks into line, emptying their crops of the night's kill, disgorging the remains of their prey and shoving it into the maw of their brood.

Singly, then in masses, the lodges launch from their rocky hold, trailing fire and smoke. The fire plunges down the watercourse in a flume of gold. The smoke of many fires merge into a single column. It curls and swirls, quartering and hunting the wind.

A great eagle bursts from the shroud of the uncertain plume, a bear claw necklace in its beak. It lofts into the sky, disappearing in wild, perfect silence.

Rey Duarte is my best friend. He makes chokecherry wine that is the most god-awful stuff you have ever drank. A teaspoon will blister the shell off an egg. One tumbler and you're wrassling the dogs. Two tumblers and you're wrassling Rey. Three tumblers will...actually no one has ever drunk three tumblers.

Rey is married to Angelina. The three of us like to hang out together. Rey and I amuse Angelina.

She says we should be married to each other. We finish each other's sentences. We make up bullshit to argue about. We tell each other the same tired jokes, over and over and over again. And we laugh at them, trying to beat each other to the punch line. We laugh till we hurt.

Angelina says we suffer from ADD; Adult Deficiency Disorder.

I am in love with Angelina. I imagine ways to betray Rey with her. He is my best friend. I am his bad friend.

Rey has lupus. You wouldn't know it to look at him. He is one big Mexicano. Strong. Dark. Strong. He takes all kinds of medicine, including immunosuppressants.

Its the immunosuppressants that cause all the worry. Any little thing can turn into a full blown crisis.

A little over a year ago Rey came down with viral meningitis. He went to the hospital in a coma.

Angelina and I stayed up all night, scared, dreading the morning. We clung to each other for hours by his bedside. When we could no longer stand, we went to another room and clung to each other.

I told her I loved Rey. I told her I loved her. She told me she loved Rey. She told me she loved me.

We've never spoken of what passed between us. We've never spoken of what we did or how we felt.

Tonight she called me to tell me that Rey has come down with pneumonia and is in the hospital. Intensive care. Can I come home, just for a few days? Rey needs me. She needs me.

I am waiting for my flight. I am having a new dream.

I am in Rey's hospital room. He sleeps. His breath smells like chokecherry wine.

I kiss his hand. I kiss his forehead. I kiss his lips.

In wild, perfect, silence.

Angry Mama

I woke up in an exceptionally good mood given the gallon of fluid in my sinuses, and then I opened my inbox where this story had been sent by a friend and now my mood is shot.

Faced with mounting unpaid lunch charges, Albuquerque Public Schools last month instituted a "cheese sandwich policy," serving a cold cheese sandwich, fruit and a milk carton to children whose parents are supposed to pay for some or all of their regular meals but fail to pick up the tab.

Such policies have become a necessity for schools seeking to keep budgets in the black while ensuring children don't go hungry. School districts in Chula Vista, Calif.; Hillsborough County, Fla.; and Lynnwood, Wash. have similar policies.

"have become a necessity" is a telling rhetorical choice; always be suspicious of passive voice of formulations that absent the agent in sentences about policy decisions. We are to believe there are no other ways to make up budget shortfall than to single out poor children in the most storied location of school-aged social hierarchies - the lunchroom?

Second grader Danessa Vigil said she had to eat cheese sandwiches because her mother couldn't afford to give her lunch money while her application for free lunch was being processed.

Now, "every time I eat it, it makes me feel like I want to throw up," the 7-year-old said.

And now I want to throw up too, Danessa. Especially when I read this:

Some Albuquerque parents have pleaded with school board members to stop singling out their children because they're poor, while others are thanking the district for a policy that demands parental responsibility.

If I never hear the word 'responsibility' again it will be too soon. That hag Michelle Malkin and her cronies (refuse to link) are crowing all over the internet about their goddamn "Tea Parties" today, where incensed tax payers historically and righteously protest the stimulus bill as an encroachment on their personal liberties and a series of rewards for home owners who failed to act responsibly. In Albuquerque, people are thanking the school board for shaming poor children because they see it as an appropriate consequence for parents who have the audacious irresponsibility to be poor.

Firstly, shame shame shame on you. These are children.

Secondly, just stop. All this blather about how unfair it is that some people get bailed out or people aren't made the suffer the consequences of their poor decisions - all this outrage is predicated on some fiction that shit was fair to begin with. Here's the word: shit is not fair. It isn't. Every single one of you has been unfairly disenfranchised and unfairly enfranchised. That is how this racist, sexist, heterosexist, postcolonial, globally capitalistic world works. There was never any premise of fairness on which everything operated. So screaming about your demands for fairness now, in addition to being indecorous, is a very thinly veiled disclosure of your contempt for the poor. You don't want thins to be fair or people to be more responsible. You just don't want the poor to be helped.

And I repeat - shaming children for what you perceive to be the sins of their parents is a mortal sin, I feel sure. In the lunchroom, of all goddamn places.

UPDATE: Miriam at Feministing was on this yesterday, I see. Fairly depressing and very interesting comment thread ensues, wherein many people insist that there is nothing at all shaming or objectionable about this policy.

Friday Conventional Wisdom

You know, I never do any fluff on here. I'm all serious all the time. So I'm re-blogging this meme from Amanda Marcotte, which is pretty rad. It's a cross between "25 things" and the "Random Ten"--you put your music player on shuffle and the songs that come up are the answers to the questions.

1. What do your friends say about you?
"Walking out of Stride"--Badly Drawn Boy (That could either be a reference to me "marching to my own drum" or the fact that I'm a really fucking slow walker and everyone complaints about it)

2. How would your coworkers describe you?
"Thank You"---Boyz II Men

3. How would you describe yourself?
"Kim's Watermelon Gun"--Flaming Lips (i.e. I have no fucking clue how to describe myself)

4. What do you like in a romantic partner?
“Sleeping Bear, Sault St. Marie"---Sufjan Stevens (Aww, so cute! B/c this is a favorite song of dude's, plus I refer to him on-blog as the bear. Mega cute)

5. How do you feel today?
"Coolin' by Sound"--Pavement (I am, in fact, totally jammin' in my office)

6. What is your life’s purpose?
“Hunting Bears"---Radiohead (Hmm. Weird, due to aforementioned bear reference. Or maybe I should join the NRA.)

7. What is your motto?
"Writing to Reach You"---Travis (Ohhhh so very poetic! I'm a writer! Bleh barf.)

8. What do you think about the most?
"Everything in Its Right Place"---Radiohead (I'm ocd?)

9. What are you going to do on your next vacation?
"Let your light shine on"---Ladykillers soundtrack (doesn't sound like a vacation to me..)

10. What do you think of your first love/date?
"All the love in the World"--Nine Inch Nails (Um. Sample lyrics: "Hiding in the crowd, I'm all alone
No one's heard a single word I've said
They don't sound as good outside my head")

11. What is your life story
"Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough"---Michael Jackson

12. What did you do yesterday?
"Covered Up In Mines"--Centro-Matic

13. What do you think of when you see the person you like/love?
"Little One"---Beck (Aww.)

14. What describes your wedding? (Very weird question for an unmarried woman)
"Bitches Ain't Shit But Hos and Tricks"---Dr. Dre (HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH. I guess this means that when my position on marriage is that it's a disgusting tool of the patriarchy?)

15. What will they play at your funeral?
“John Wayne Gacy Jr"---Sufjan Stevens (I'm going to be murdered by a fucking serial killer??! That's how I'm gonna go out? Goddamnit. That or I'm going to become one...)

16. What is your obsession?
"Whenever You Breathe Out, I Breathe In"---Modest Mouse (Not only am I a serial killer, I'm a CPR fetishist?)

17. What is your biggest fear?
"The Body Breaks"---Devendra Banhart

18. What is your biggest secret?
"Spit and Fire"---Rainer Maria (I do like to spit, which is UNLADYLIKE and GROSS)

19. What is your biggest turn-on?
"No Woman No Cry"---Wyclef Jean (social justice FTW!)

20. How do you describe your friends?
"Much Finer"---Le Tigre

21. What would you do with a million dollars?
"Instant Pleasure"---Rufus Wainwright (Fuck yeah I'm a playa y'all)

22. What is your opinion of sex?
"Black Tongue"---Yeah Yeah Yeahs (I really do not know).

23. What is your biggest regret?
"Forgive them Father"---Lauryn Hill (Heh. I guess that means I don't have any regrets, but for those who do, I hope they get over 'em)

24. What would you rather be doing right now?
"Where Is My Mind"---The Pixies (I'd rather be high?)

25. What will you post this list as?
"Conventional Wisdom"---Built to Spill

Pixies! Great song, and great use in a film



I like "Bitches Ain't Shit" because it's the most ridiculously over-the-top misogyny I've ever heard, it goes from offensive to hilarious

Cover your ears, boys

Did Abigail Zuger (a doctor!)'s review of Rachel Kauder Nalebuff’s My Little Red Book, a book of first period stories that spans World War II to the present, America to Poland to India, really need to include this nugget?

At this point, male readers may want to go outside and toss a ball around for a while. No matter how sympathetic, how curious or how deeply interested in life’s little yuck factors you are, this collection is unlikely to hold more than the mildest intellectual appeal for you.

Yes, because men can not possibly be interested in things that are not a part of their personal experience. Especially, ew, things that have to do with girls.

Can we give men just a slight bit of credit, Dr. Zuger and the New York Times? Or, if we're not willing to acknowledge that not all men are self-absorbed assholes, maybe for once write an article about something that pertains to women without reassuring men that we know you don't care, poor dears, but just go think about sports and it'll be over soon and we'll be back to talking about you.

Jesus Christ in a nutsack.

UPDATE: Also relevant to the conversation is this comment to a really great Feministing Community post. Commenter feministinmississippi says:

whenever there is a group of girls talking about girl/women centered stuff, and there is a guy present, someone usually points out how the guy might be uncomfortable or not enjoying the conversation, but it doesn't always happen the other way around. for example, my friend was listening to "girly" music with some of her friends and one of them pointed out how their guy friend seemed bored. but how often do guys do that for a lone female friend?

This is spot-on, and I have literally never had male friends apologize and/or change the subject for my benefit. I will admit that it sometimes annoys me, because I am used to the female-coded model of "we have to include everyone in the conversation." But really, among friends, that's bullshit. Generally, I find my friends interesting, and if they're talking about something I either don't know about or don't care about, I figure that they're interested for a reason and try to direct the conversation to what I want to know about the topic. Or just change the subject. Sometimes a tall order when you run with friends like mine, but I think it's a far better solution than the "oh, you're bored, aren't you?" route.

UPDATE II: For my previous writing on menstruation and my own period story, see here.

Gimme All Your Poo Poo Na Na

A few days I asked for suggestions on what to give up for Lent.

The consensus was that I should give up reclining on my narrow behind and give something back to the community.

While the notion is alien to me (I mean, what's in it for me?) I forwarded the suggestions to Bridget and she heartily ratified same.

So, I toddled off to the nursing home where my mother resides to see if I could be of any assistance.

Those who are happy to see Taddy off his leisure and are not content with his prayerful devotions will be happy to learn the nursing home management accepted with enthusiasm my offer of gratis labor.

Their first directive was for to me buss tables at resident mealtimes and push a snack cart from room to room in between times. I declined this assignment on the grounds that I would not volunteer to do work that was bargained for under the terms of a collective bargaining agreement. Also, the tips are for shit.

Management assured me that I had no worries on that score as they had no bargaining agreement with their employees. So, that right there, is another Lenten project for me.

As to tips, this is Northern Wisconsin. Tips? We don't leave no stinking tips.

From there we moved to the subject of musical entertainment. Every other day, there is a musical program for the residents. This is put on by a very talented gentleman in residence who pounds out some of the old classics on an electric piano; Time after Time, Mairzie Doats, Pennsylvania 6-5000, that sort of thing.

I said I play a little guitar and would be glad to accompany their own virtuoso.

As it happened, yesterday the pianist was a little under the weather and not up to performing for the (mostly) ladies in attendance. I fired up the old Stratocaster and searched through the baroque geezer's sheet music and came across, I crap you negative, a score for this little ditty.

Now, the (mostly) ladies in attendance responded wildly to the performance, especially the extended guitar solo. The management, however, took a frosty, one might say, medieval, attitude toward my riffs and rang down the curtain.

Today is Pet Day at the nursing home. The local shelter brings dogs and cats and hamsters and guppies and whatnot for the residents to pet and caress. Everyone, of all ages, loves a furry caress, of course, given or taken.

I'm summoned to help out with this excercise and I think I'm well suited since I love pets and I love (mostly) ladies. Not sure why they told me to bring a scoop and a bucket.

Maybe they still expect me to buss tables.

scattered, like ashes

Did y'all know that Dr. B is giving up the blog-posting for Lent? Yea. She even started early because of the implicit competition that is always running here at Casa de Bitch about who is the best Catholic. Not willing to be bested by such a strategy, I have decided, after much meditation about maximizing privation, to give up my job. That just won't take effect until May. But don't worry, I am thinking about it all the time in preparation.

I am also giving up treats, so I am making this my new home page to help keep the appetite low.

I also wanted to point out that the snarky, bitchy, pop-culture-indulging mamas at MamaPop have kindly designated this here blog as one of the best in the known universe. Danke.

Finally, will someone go here and figure out what the hell I am supposed to want to do with this site? I want to love it but I can't figure out why.

Callin Elvis

I didn't watch the GOP response to the President's Address to a Joint Session of Congress.

I assume it was the usual string of non-sequitirs, chestnuts, an oily restatement of their shoot-the-wounded policy, and dreamy appeals to their ghosts .

Samhita on Slumdog

I've been poo-pooing criticisms of Slumdog Millionaire, but Samhita makes some great points over at Feministing. She also links to a great piece by Mitu Sengupta at Alternet critiquing the film as a "hollow message of Social Justice." I have mixed feelings about this criticism. On the one hand, the film is so clearly a fantasy story, that I don't know that it's trying to convey a "message," about social justice or anything else. It's unrealistic. It does not attempt authenticity. It employs flashbacks and shifts in time to create a wonderland-effect which is at odds with the gritty realism of some of the images (not, mind you, the cinematography, which is very polished and cinematic). I think people make the mistake of assuming it's trying to present something "real" because movies don't usually feature or address poverty, especially third-world poverty, unless they're trying to convey something "real" and convey a "message." At the same time, I find this, from Mitu, convincing:

It is ironic that "Slumdog", for all its righteousness of tone, shares with many Indian political and social elites a profoundly dehumanizing view of those who live and work within the country's slums. The troubling policy implications of this perspective are unmistakeably mirrored by the film. Since there are no internal resources, and none capable of constructive voice or action, all "solutions" must arrive externally.

After a harrowing life in an anarchic wilderness, salvation finally comes to Jamal, a Christ-like figure, in the form of an imported quiz-show, which he succeeds in thanks to sheer, dumb luck, or rather, because “it is written.” Is it also "written," then, that the other children depicted in the film must continue to suffer? Or must they, like the stone-faced Jamal, stoically await their own “destiny” of rescue by a foreign hand?

It seems like Jamal is dragging himself by his super-high-intelligence bootstraps out of poverty, because it's a story about a quiz show and that seems like where the story would be going. But it's not. Jamal knows all the answers by chance, he gets on the show by chance, he's spared by the police by chance. It's not his doing. In fact, the only real virtue he seems to have, beyond basic kindness, is the dogged pursuit of Latika, with whom he is basically obsessed with his entire life.

And that's where we get to Samhita's critique of the Latika character:

I understand that in Boyle's imagination, Latika was like any third world woman. A helpless victim that can't speak up for herself and stays in an abusive relationship, until she is saved by another man. Outside of oversimplifying the complex ways that women of color experience AND resist violence within their own communities, it reinforces stereotypes of helpless third world women. I must say, I tried to ignore this plotline in the beginning. Perhaps if I thought about it too much, I would come out against a film that is supposed to "help" my people or because I just wanted to enjoy something for once without the nagging reality that this story doesn't make sense without the depiction of a violent patriarchy. But the unfortunate reality is that in order for South Asians to make it into the mainstream, they have to cater to the lowest common denominator of universal experience. And that is of course one where women have no agency, especially in the context of the third world. I mean that is why we are fighting all these wars right? To save women!

I had this exact same reaction, but I liked the movie so much in other ways that I basically blocked it out of my mind. But during the movie, it nagged at me. Latika was a main character in the film, but she basically didn't talk except to say how scared and unhappy she was. She didn't really have a personality, and we as the viewers had absolutely no idea why Jamal was so in love with her.

As with many movies, we're just supposed to assume that he loves her beyond all other cares in the world because she's mega hott, duh. And he really kind of stalks her all over India. It's not really clear whether she reciprocates the feelings for him, and if so, why.

So I guess I'm left with sort of an empty movie. It's clearly not supposed to be a movie with a message about social justice, but it kind of sucks as a love story, too, since one side of the love line is basically an acted-upon object.

And after all this, I still really, really want to like it. I still really did like it. Ugh. Movies can be really annoying when you're a feminist.

Quadragesima

In these times of spreading recession and privation, the Lenten fast may seem redundant. Where is the penitent value in giving up luxuries or willing an end to extraneous appetites when the spreading recession is forcing us to cut out those things anyway? What is the virtue of going hungry in the time of the Hunger Moon?

To be honest, I'm not sure. I'm not much for deep thinking. As to self-denial, I gave that up a long time ago.

Still, I adopt Lenten abstinence out of respect for the customs of my faith and the traditions of my family. OK, OK mostly I fast because my cousin Bridget badgers the shit out of me. She has decided that we should say the Rosary daily during Lent and calls me every couple days to check me out.

Did you say your Rosary today, Taddy?

Uh, yeah.

Bullshit. I thought you gave up lying.

I thought you gave up cussing.

Don't sass me.

Yes, ma'am.

My Da taught us that Lent reinforces the three just practices of a righteous person; justice towards God, justice towards self, and justice towards our neighbors. Although he has been gone for almost 20 years, I can still feel his presence, especially at this time of year, prodding me to do the right thing.

He was an Irishman and, by definition a romantic. He was also an eminently practical man and believed, devoutly, in making virtue of necessity. The fact that times is hard would not be acceptable to him as a reason for failure to seek out some sort of voluntary self-denial.

He was not sympathetic to our complaints of being broke or not having some toy or some fashionable wear that our friends had. His inevitable reply to our claims of deprivation was that it builds character. Offer it up to God, he would say.

So, what should I be offering up to God this year? Simply giving up strong spirits for the duration seems trivial, unworthy of the crisis into which we are cast. I could give up smoking as well but, you know, lets not go nuts.

I am open to suggestion. Any ideas, short of scourging myself with barbed wire, will be considered. Actually, I'll forward them to Bridget to consider and she will decide, as she always does, what will best turn my soul towards grace.

In the meantime, I'm headed over to look at some property near Green Bay. With luck, I'll find a hard pressed infidel ready to sell me his house for a pittance. Cause I'm all for justice to my neighbors but, you know, lets not go nuts.

predix

Oscar night! I'm glad to have something to pull me out of the fever den that is once again the Vane house. People are talking about this year's movies and show being a snooze, or more of a snooze than usual, but I don't know, I feel like the movies are as good as they ever are. I'm glad that Nate Silver got into the prediction game as I had missed him since the election's end. Below are select Sybil Vane predictions. [Note to persons who know Sybil Vane in real life and are perhaps hosting her at an Oscar's party - this does not constitute my real life ballot! Sybil Vane has her own rhyme and reason. And is less invested in the bragging rights of winning the pool.]

Original Score: Slumdog. After the due-date Grammy performance, I will never ever bet against M.I.A.

Art Direction and Cinematography: Dark Knight

Foreign Language: Waltz with Bashir

Best Actress: Meryl. This Slate piece convinced me I sort of hate The Reader and I'm over the Kate Winslet thing now.

Best Actor: Sean Penn. I can't really get behind the Mickey Rourke comeback narrative.

Best Supporting Actor: the inevitable Heath Ledger win.

Best Supporting Actress: I'm going with the long shot Marisa Tomei here, thinking the Academy sees as a way to honor the Mickey Rourke comeback narrative without actually having to honor Mickey Rourke.

Best Director: Danny Boyle

Best Picture: Slumdog There's been a lot of hating on this movie from a lot of different sectors. I will speak to this aspect alone: my experience was of a film that was interested in indulging the intoxicatingly redemptive modes film *can* traffic in, while acknowledging that such indulgence is precisely that - escapist indulgence. So, ok, I like that.

Disagree and agree in comments, esp on categories I didn't weigh in on. Hope you all have fun parties to go to. If you're into that sort of thing.

A Different Kind of Rape

My first love was from Texas. I fell deeply, crazily, unabashedly in love when I was seventeen, and even though it seems sort of insane to me now, I can't deny how very exciting that first love was. It was the classic sort of teenage love that made you do really stupid things, like lie to your parents, sulk around moodily when you had to be away from your enamored (which, in my case, was all the time, since he lived on a different continent), and make really foolish decisions. And though I now see that it would have been a real disaster had we ended up together, I can also recognize that I got a lot of positive things out of that relationship.

When I started having sex, and realized that my sexual persona was about "doing" things, not about "looking" a certain way, I embraced a [very crude and ill-defined] form of fat acceptance. Of course, it's a real stretch to say I was even fat at the time, but I certainly felt fat and got countless messages to the same tune. Several months after I'd "lost my virginity", I told my dad that I never wanted to hear any commentary about my weight from him again. In the intervening 9 years, he's mostly complied.

So there was that. There was also the intense creativity that came with my whirlwind romance. I wrote poetry, I read voraciously, I wrote songs, I made videos. The first year or two were a great time for my nascent self, sexual discovery, and developing a fierce sense of autonomy and defiance. And though there were a lot of other things that came later in the relationship that were really kind of awful, I still regard it as a net positive, and not something I regret. We dated for four years.

Last night, I attended the Yes Means Yes reading, where I got to (briefly) meet the lovely Jaclyn, and be in room with at least fifty other women who were all there, enraptured, ready to listen and talk. Half of the time I was there, sitting and thinking, where did these women come from? Where can I find them? How can I get to know them? So many interesting-looking people, old and young, butch and femme, queer and straight, trans and cisgender.

When I left, my mind was buzzing, and at night laying in bed with my boyfriend I must have rambled non-stop for forty-five minutes about all the things I was thinking about, the new concepts I'd been introduced to. In particular, I was sort of shocked at how common sexual assault was among this group. Every presenter, and many people who came up afterward and said "I was raped." People who knew people. And I was thinking that talking frankly about rape is such an important part of what happens in the feminist blogosphere, and even though we're a fairly prominent feminist blog, it's not a part of the set of personal experiences we talk about here. I don't know whether any of my fellow contributors have been through sexual assault, and I'm not challenging them to say so. But the fact that I consistently think of myself as someone who has not been sexually assaulted is a shining example of the way this discourse is extremely limited.

Because I have been raped.

Not in any of the ways that are part of the discourse. I did not endure a "stranger" rape. I have never been seriously attacked in public (although I've been groped upward of ten times). I have never endured "date rape." I have never been with someone who was so much older than me, or had such authority over me, that it called my ability for true consent into question. I was not a victim of incest. I have never been pressured into having sex when all I wanted to do was make out (although lord knows many tried when I was in high school).

Instead, my rape took the form of withholding and control. I will admit that I have not wanted to call it rape. I still do not want to call it rape, and am forcing myself to do so right now, and it is painful.

You see, a few years after me and my first love, from Texas, got together, the sex dropped off precipitously. My boyfriend was very attractive to me, and I was constantly horny. I wanted to have boring sex, kinky sex, and everything in between. But he withheld. He withheld sex and most forms of physical affection from me until it made me crazy. I don't know why he did it. But it became a constant form of negotiation, with me trying to get affection and sex, and him finding all kinds of reasons to decline. The nascent body-acceptance that I had formed before went off a cliff.

And then one night, after months of this, I awoke in the middle of the night to find him rubbing up against me with a hard-on. I was in that bizarre zone between wake and sleep, where everything seemed blurry and confused and it was difficult to identify reality. And before I could get out of that in-between zone, he was on top of me and penetrating me. I, of course, was not wet, having just been asleep, and not otherwise aroused. But this was what I wanted. I wanted sex and physical closeness so badly--how could I say no? Even in my diminished state, a "take-it-while-I-can-get-it" mentality took over, and I did not protest. I winced in a little pain. After he was done he kissed me and went back to sleep. I was left lying there, confused, upset. What about me? I was just starting to get aroused at the very end of the thing, and now, what was I supposed to do?

I went to the living room and cried my eyes out.

But it gets worse. This became a routine. For months and months, the only time we would ever have sex or be sexual was in the middle of the night, just like that. When I was asleep and groggy, quiet and undemanding. Sometimes it hurt, sometimes it didn't. Sometimes I would just go back to sleep. Sometimes I would cry. Sometimes I would get myself off quietly, and then cry.

I would try to initiate sex at other times, and I was almost always rebuffed. Sometimes I would be rebuffed at 10 pm, only to have him wake me up to fuck me four hours later when I was fast asleep.

How do I frame this kind of experience? How do I call this rape in a discourse where only violence, only strangeness, only force and unwillingness begets rape? There was no violence. It was someone I knew and loved, and wanted to have sex with so badly it hurt. But he had to find the only moments where I wasn't willing, where I wasn't wanting, and fuck me then. Withhold from me and put me in a position where I didn't want to say no. Where I felt I couldn't.

I don't know why he did it. I don't know if I was sexually intimidating or sexually demanding. I don't know if my enthusiastic consent wasn't a turn-on, but a turn-off.

It is extremely hard to tell this story publicly, but I think it is vital to expanding the dialogue about rape. Because I haven't heard a story like this before, and I'm not so self-absorbed to think that I must be the only one. But in a discourse dominated by "no means no," I don't know how a story like this can come out as a story about rape. Not to say that the "no means no" crowd would reject my story, say it's not rape, but that in such a discourse, someone like me would never think of it as rape. But when we move to a "yes means yes" discourse, our understanding is broadened. It's not that I refused that sex. I didn't refuse. I never said no. I never resisted. But my boyfriend chose to initiate sex with me at the only moments where I couldn't, and wouldn't, give enthusiastic consent. And in so doing deprived me of getting sexual pleasure out of our only sexual encounters, which were boring at best, painful at worst.

And that's rape.

As a side note, after five or six months of this, I came to him one day and told him I didn't want him to initiate sex with me in the middle of the night ever again, and that I didn't like it. He became upset, angry, moody, and silent. And refused to engage in sex with me or show me substantial physical affection for several months.

It felt like punishment, for speaking up.

Let This Groove Sink In Your Shoes

Just heard the Obamas are having Earth Wind and Fire to play at the White House this Sunday.

Maurice, Philip, and the lads; now that's what I call stimulus.

The report of EWF coming to the White House got me thinking about Old School, what it means to me and what it meant to me back in the days when it was, well, New School.


Now, Old School, for me, is a little older, even, than what is now defined as Old School. When I think Old School, I'm thinking James Brown, Isley Bros, Aretha, Sam and Dave, Marvin Gaye, Al Green, Harold Melvin, and the incomparable Otis Redding. Luther, Teddy P (a Harold Melvin alumni), Jeffrey Osborne, the Brothers Johnson, and the long list of wonderful artists too numerous to list; they're more recent, by my definition of recent, but, you know, its all good.


So, I started writing about how I first got turned on to the Old School as a little ghuedo in rural Wisconsin, about listening to the blowtorch AM soul stations like WAWA and WTOS on my tinny transistor, late at night; my brothers and I bopping to the Wicked Pickett, trying to copy the moves of the Temps and the O'Jays, straining to hit the high notes with Smoky Robinson.


I thought about how, even as our culture seems to be getting less segregated, our music seems to be getting more segregated. When my brothers and I were coming up, you could hear everything on Top 40 radio. If it was popular, it was played. Soul, Sinatra, Country, Blues, Rock and Roll, movie scores, whatever. Now, radio is so carved up into niches that you have to know what you want to hear before you hear it. And then go look for it.


But that's another post.


Anyhow, I remembered Steve Harvey's riff on Old School in the great, great movie, The Original Kings of Comedy.


I looked it up on the YouTube, figuring to get more inspiration on the subject. I found it and watched it and realized there was almost nothing I could add to what Steve had to say.


So put your hands together for an Original Kang, Mister Steeeeeeve Harvey!

* Oh, it might not be entirely safe for the job due to language. So turn it down a bit and tell Booboo in the next cubicle to get back to work and mind his own damn business.

**Steve doesn't appear for about a minute and a half into the video, so, give it a little time.

The Eighteenth Brumaire of taddyporter

Dinner for one:

one d'Anjou pear
four slices sharp cheddar
half jar of pickled pike
one bag BBQ chips
two corn tortillas
two fudge brownies
two 16 oz bottles Point beer
one bowl neck bones

I have to got to get me some friends around here.

Rainbows and Unicorns

I have been pissing on academia a lot lately, so now I would like to note, in the interest of perspective, a distinct advantage of the profession: I can work in the bathtub.

Any other similarly sunshiney rosey-colored comments welcome.

A Blog Memoir in 25 Things (inspired by Facebook)

25. I was unofficially voted Most Likely to Flirt With Your Boyfriend. The truth of this depends on what alcohol is at hand. (See #24.)

There are two early memories I have of boys, both named David. Well, there are more than two memories and more than two boys, but these are the most telling.

David Oliver was my first childhood crush, a teenage boy who lived in our apartment complex on Santa Rosalia. (Which we pronounced San-ta Ro-sa-lee-ya, an iambic, musical sound I’d whisper to myself.) Back then I didn’t know that we were poor; I thought our white stuccoed apartment building was beautiful. Scarlet bougainvillea crawled over the front walls, sunlight shined warmly across the hard wood floors of our apartment and so what if my sister and I slept in what was clearly supposed to be the dining room. We had a piano our father would play while making up funny songs to make our mother laugh, mom made hammocks strung across the hallway so we could swing quietly in the air (while I imagined we lived in trees like bananas) and we would sometimes climb into a cardboard box and launch ourselves down the smoothly worn stone steps to crash against the front door below.

(We did this until my mother decided it wasn’t exactly safe for me to send my light-as-air sister hurtling through second story space to bust through the front screen while I pealed with laughter on the landing above.)

But David lived across the automotive oil-splattered courtyard with his single mother who was, more often than not, drunk on her ass. He was a light brown color and his bouncy afro was smooth, neat and medium sized; he was as thin as Encyclopedia Brown and he liked hanging out with our dad who was handsome, young, employed and friendly to everyone in the building. I see now that the patterns of my youth pretty much dictated what my later family life would be: my father would be everyone’s father figure and every man I met would be a rival for my father’s affection.

Buried in my family’s stuff, my dad still has the audio tape of a recording he and David made, spoofing the old TV show, Kung Fu. You play it and first you hear the shooshy white noise of a handheld tape recorder then the wobbly theme music of the show. Then you hear my dad’s voice as Master, giving Grasshopper a test. It’s five minutes of improvised nonsense about the price of eggs in the ghetto and in the background you can hear my mother laughing while my father and David struggle to keep it together. I love listening to that tape.

He would come over a couple of nights a week or on the weekends to practice on our piano. I remember he said that he wanted to go to Julliard. I was only a kid, maybe 5 or 6, but I would hide behind the wood slatted doors of our dining/bedroom and listen to him practice and felt something that made my little girly chest squeeze tight. My unreliable memory tells me he practiced Moonlight Sonata but my common sense tells me I have no way of knowing what it was he played all those times.

Between the slats of the door, I’d watch him, unable to take my eyes off his long fingers running over the keys, playing music my dad didn’t know. Everyone in the house would stop to listen to him – mom, standing still at the stove; my little sister huddled at my back; my father in the living room with David, listening.

With the hindsight that comes with pop psychology, age and a couple years of therapy I realize, and have peace with the fact, that David was playing for my father. My little crush on him was nothing compared to the love and yearning David had for a father like mine. His love swamped the paper boat of my five-year old squishy feelings, which were probably created more by the music than actually falling in love with a 15 year old neighbor.

When we later moved to our new house (doesn’t every childhood, ‘first love’ story end with someone moving?) I remember clearly that David clung to my father and cried.

(Here is where I hope my memory has betrayed me.)

We never saw David again. I think that we had heard, through old friends, that his mother stayed at the apartments while the Santa Rosalia neighborhood crumbled around them and that David may have become just another young black male statistic, cut down by the death-dealing gangs of Los Angeles.

The 39-year old me thinks about the gentle, 15-year old he’d been and, oh, how I wish that he’d made it to Julliard.

…

There was a little loud black kid, David, who was in my third or fourth grade class. He had freckles, a square-top ‘fro, and jumped around the playground with his little gang of friends, like a terrier. My friends back then consisted of the Girl Who Peed, the Girl Who Wore Pajamas to School and the Girl Who Picked Her Nose. I was not high on the Mar Vista Elementary social totem pole.

One day he bounced up and began to run the dozens on the Girl Who Wore Pajamas to School. She was mortified; I could see little tears beginning to form in the corner of her eyes. Then he shoved me in the chest and called me fat. Without hesitation I kicked him in his little elementary school balls so hard he dropped in mid-laugh.

Sure, I got sent to the principal’s office; sure, they called my parents (my father, who worked the night shift at the station was home for the call and when he heard it was basically self defense, he told the principal to stop wasting his time when she should be calling the bully’s mother, instead) and, sure, they made me apologize in the end to little sniffling David.

But I’ll never forget the feeling of shock, anger and then the adrenaline-propelled pleasure as I stood over David’s keening body on the cracked elementary school playground.

Girls are taught to avoid pleasure. Pleasure will give us a reputation; it will get us in trouble. But when I felt my little third/fourth grade foot connect with David’s testicles, and heard his laugh choke off, that’s what I felt. Pleasure.

No one likes higher taxes?

Actually, I do. I would gladly pay higher taxes if that meant that I and the rest of my community got better services. Especially at the city and state level. So I had to snort a little bit at Marcus Gilmer's Chicagoist post where he states that Illinois is a state "where we tax the shit out of everything."

That's pretty wrong. Maybe Mr. Gilmer thinks so because of some of the more creative taxes that have been proposed in recent years, like, say, the bottled water tax. It's true that sales tax in Chicago is pretty high (10.25%). But one of the states' important sources of revenue, income tax, is a complete joke. It's a flat 3%, which, if you know anything about taxes, is incredibly regressive. Well, to be precise, it's not regressive according to the technical definition, because the rate doesn't decrease as the amount subject to the tax increases. But "regressive" taxation usually refers to taxes that impose a greater burden on the poor than on the rich. And a flat tax rate certainly fits the bill. So to speak.

Not to mention the fact that 3% is kind of hilariously low for a choice of flat tax rate. It's not even an attempt to fund state services. Instead, a substantial portion of the revenue is supposed to come from sales taxes, which--surprise!--are also very regressive. This may seem confusing, but it's regressive because lower-income people tend to spend a larger portion of their income on purchases than more well-off people do. Not because they buy more stuff, but because there is a certain baseline level of purchases you need to make to survive. Even if you're poor, you still have to spend several hundred dollars a month on food.

I think it would do us well to increase state income tax, particularly since states are the ones providing some of the most badly-needed services. Like Medicaid. I was reading this NYTimes article about uninsured young adults, and got a little confused by one section.

Most family insurance policies cut off dependents when they turn 19 or finish college, and many young adults start out in New York cobbling together part-time or freelance work with no benefits. To qualify for Medicaid, a single adult can earn no more than $706 a month — less than what a full-time minimum-wage earner makes. Yet the average insurance premium for a single adult is $900 a month, according to a spokesman for the State Insurance Department.

This makes it sound like in New York, you can get Medicaid if you make less than $706/month.

Is this true? Because in Illinois, just being poor isn't enough to get you health care from the state. You have to be poor and disabled (and not just by your own assertion, you have to be adjudged disabled by the state, which is incredibly hard to do), or you have to have kids and be poor. If you are poor and in need of medication to live (psych meds don't count, even though they could very well save your life), you can get a limited medical card that pays for the medication only. I'm talking a very limited number of conditions: diabetes, epilepsy, and hypertension.

So for someone like my boyfriend and my other unemployed friends, who don't have children, aren't disabled, and don't have any of the conditions I named, they don't get squat. Even though they may go six months without earning a dime. Nothing. And for the many clients I had with serious medical conditions who were waiting the years-long process to be adjudged disabled, nothing. They got no care whatsoever, while their conditions worsened.

If paying a higher state tax could maybe convince the state to provide health care for people with no money and no job, I'd do it. Hell, there's a lot of things I'd do it for.

Breaking

The [North Dakota] House voted 51-41 this afternoon to declare that a fertilized egg has all the rights of any person.

Rep. Dan Ruby feel like he is just answering t he question Roe v Wade begged: "This is the exact language that's required by Roe vs. Wade. It stipulated that before a challenge can be made, we have to identify when life begins, and that's what this does."

Hear that, thinkers of the world? A legislative body in North Dakota just answered the question of when life begins. Done. Cross that one off the whiteboard. Whew.

Who You Fighting For?

At the risk of returning to the Occupation well once too often, I'm back because my strong, bright, beautiful, beloved, Marine Corps niece has just been notified she will be called to Occupation duty in May.

She's a three year veteran of the USMC and has already spent over a year in Iraq, both ashore and afloat. She was discharged in August and placed in the Individual Ready Reserve. She started college in September, the first in our family to do so.

I don't mean to be tiresome on this subject but I will not let it go. I know my view of the need for continued US occupation of Iraq diverges from the views of many, maybe most, in the BPhD readership. I respect the concerns of those who feel prolonging US occupation of Iraq is necessary for safeguarding the peoples of Iraq. I disagree with those views. Strongly. Adamantly. Urgently. Still, I respect them.



But this is not an abstract notion for my family. That's our flesh and blood out there. That's my family's future out there. Who is safeguarding them?


I repeat; Iraq is not short of armies. They have dozens of Iraqi armies to choose from. If armies could solve the problems of the Iraqi people, the country would be a paradise.


But they can't. And its not. More armies, more problems. I just don't see what my nephews and nieces can do for them. I don't see what our military occupation can do for them.


I agree we owe the Iraqi people help. And I support all assistance to them short of military occupation.

But its past time to end the occupation. We can't afford it. We don't want it. And my family can't stand it.

We've given them enough of our soldiers, sailors, Marines, and aircrew. And enough is enough.

"Sexy"

About two weeks ago, I was sitting in the nearby urban-professional-white-people-lunch-establishment, eating my bland lunch, when I noticed someone very striking. It was a young woman, probably about my age or barely older, and she was ordering coffee. I remember her outfit very carefully, because I stared at it. She was wearing a dark-green cotton minidress, so short that it barely covered her butt. Then a giant bronze belt cinched tight around her waist, and many strands of glittery beads. Black leggings (not tights) were operating basically as pants. She was wearing black slouchy ankle boots and had a giant leather mustard-colored handbag. I don't think my description is doing it justice, but with her voluminous head of curly hair and smart black car coat, this woman looked awesome.

And you know why I paid this any attention, and why I still remember her outfit so precisely? This woman was fat. Not "chubby" or "curvy" or whatever bullshit "people-who-aren't-size-4-can-still-be-sexy-or-cute-right?-right?" euphemism we're using now. No, fat, like me. Probably more fat. And she was wearing the kind of outfit that I, and most fat women, and probably most medium-sized women too, would think "I could never wear that." I would never dream of going out in basically leggings and a long shirt. This very jarring experience, of seeing a woman who basically looks like me (although taller), wearing something I would be far too self-conscious to wear, and looking so good, really stuck with me.

I should also mention that I'm no shrinking violet when it comes to fashion, either. I never subscribed to the baggy-clothes prescription that many plus-size retailers seem to hold fast to. I wear mostly form-fitting and body-conscious clothes. I sometimes pair unconventional items together. And I look good when I want to (which is about half the time, the other half I generally don't give a shit).

But I would not wear that outfit.

On my way back to the office, I felt like something exciting had been revealed to me. (I want more belts! Maybe I should get some black leggings). I'm kinda broke, but when I do get some money this nameless woman who I will likely never see again is going to get credit for at least one fabulous outfit.

Today, I was thinking about that woman again, and about my reaction. My boyfriend just fixed my long-broken ipod, and walking around with music in my ears makes me feel infinitely more badass. So I was strutting downtown in my black dress and red coat on my way to pick up lunch, and thinking about Yes Means Yes and how it's really a shame that being "sexy" is such a constrained and loaded concept.

Because I want to be able to feel sexy. But there is no "sexy" that exists independent from rigid ideas about attractiveness, and there is no "sexy" that exists outside of being a target and a receptacle for other people's fantasies and desires. I want to be able to strut down State Street and feel like a million bucks without that nagging feeling that other people around me see me as inferior and insufficient. I want to be able to smile at passerby with a warm and sultry smile that reflects my inner mood, without worrying that someone is going to think that means they get to follow me, unwelcome, to wherever I'm going. And so "sexy" is constrained, it's boxed in and timid at every moment except the ones where I'm actually having sex, and that's far too constrained a world for sexy to live in.

Maybe tomorrow I'll try my strut again, to the same song, and try to forget all that this time.

Will some people never get it?

I won't lie - the live tour for Yes Means Yes has been, by and large, an incredible experience. Getting to travel around and talk with all kinds of people about their work and our work to heal our very diseased sexual culture and prevent rape has been like a dream come true. The passion that people are bringing to these conversations gives me hope for the world. And I'd be lying if I said I didn't love signing books that have my name on the cover, too. ;)

But there have been a few jarring moments, too. And the more I think about them and my responses to them, the more I realize how far we all have to go.

Exhibit A: At one venue, which shall remain nameless, the venue owner rushed over to me after the reading to gush about how awesome and powerful it was, how much he had learned and how his understanding of the world had been shifted. He offered to buy me a drink (bar at the venue), which of course, I accepted. As we're waiting for the drink, he's going on and on, and then he starts... fondling my hair. Not just touching my hair. Not brushing accidentally up against my hair. I mean full on stroking and petting it. This goes on for entire minutes, during which time he also manages to put his arm around me.

Now, here's the thing. He's the owner of a pretty powerful literary venue, and I'm a writer. I could totally have called him on his shit and asked him to stop. But a) I was kinda in shock that it was happening, especially given the context and b) I didn't want to piss him off, lest he never book me again. So, instead, I waved and poked wildly, behind my back, at a friend of mine who was standing close by with her back to me, until she got the hint and stole me away.

But every time I tell this story, I wonder if I should have spoken up. Taken one for the team and risked pissing him off in order to maybe prevent him from doing this to someone else. I wasn't ever in any danger - it was just creepy and inappropriate and not OK with me. Mostly I'm angry it happened - at a Yes Means Yes reading of all places! But I also can't figure out - is there a right thing to have done? And did I do it? Would it have even made a difference to his addled brain if I'd said something, or would he have just decided I was an angry bitch and gone about fondling someone else's hair the next night?

But... what if the next time he did that, that woman said something, too? Would he eventually be unable to keep blaming individual women? What's our individual responsibility to the group? Have I asked enough questions yet? No? How about now?

(p.s. - this will probably be my last post today, so thanks to everyone for the warm welcome and the great conversations so far, and please do check out the rest of our Virtual Tour, which stops at Shameless Magazine tomorrow for a Q&A with YMY contributor and Feministe blogger Jill Filipovic. I'll be keeping on lurking in the comment threads, though, so keep it up!)

Yes Means Yes: Organizing an anthology

First of all, I just want to say thanks to Bitch PhD for hosting ... this site has been a favorite for a long time, so I'm thrilled to be able to write here!

I'm going to share a little bit of my essay below - as you will probably be able to tell, it was inspired largely by the work I was doing at the time on The Purity Myth. But before we get to that, I wanted to explain the structure of the anthology a bit because it's something that I'm really excited about.

When Jaclyn and I were putting together the book, we found that it was near impossible to organize the anthology in a traditional linear fashion. It fact, it was totally impossible. We tried to do it, but the essays were too complex - and their issues too intersecting - for us to structure them in a front-to-back reading format. (That's when we started to panic a bit.)

Eventually we realized that that a blogging format could be our answer - if only you could hyperlink on paper! So what we came up with was multiple themes for each essay; kind of like a tagging process. (The themes themselves have fabulous names, too, thanks entirely to Jaclyn. Just a few: Much Taboo About Nothing, Electric Youth, Media Matters, Surviving to Yes.)

After reading Latoya Peterson’s essay on “The Not Rape Epidemic,” for example, if you want to read something else about youth sexuality, you’ll be directed to contributions from Heather Corinna ("An Immodest Proposal") and Hanne Blank ("The Process-Oriented Virgin"). But if you want to follow up about another theme Peterson addresses – say, the role of government in policing female sexuality and perpetuating rape culture, you can skip to another essay which discusses that instead.

We like to call it a "choose your own adventure" anthology! But seriously, we thought it was important that the reader be able to create the narrative in the book - this way, every time you pick up the book you can read it in a new way.

It's a format I think really works to highlight how nuanced of all the essays are, and I'm really proud (if I do say so myself!) of it. That said, I hope you like the excerpt of my essay and that you consider checking out the book for yourself!

Purely Rape: The myth of sexual purity and how it reinforces rape culture

Until 2008, the law in Maryland stated that if a woman wanted stop in the middle of intercourse and her partner refused, it wasn’t rape because once a woman is penetrated, “the damage is done.” A peeping tom case in Florida, in which a man took pictures up a teen’s skirt, was dismissed because the court ruled that the young woman had no “expectation of privacy” while wearing a skirt. And in California, a rape trial resulted in a hung jury – even after seeing a videotape of the passed out victim being raped by multiple men, penetrated vaginally and anally with pool sticks, a Snapple bottle and a lit cigarette. The defense had argued the teen was eager to make a “porn video.”

The common theme in these stories, and so many others, is the myth of sexual purity and how it reinforces rape culture. The purity myth – the lie that sexuality defines how “good” women are, and that women’s moral compasses are inextricable from their bodies – is an integral part rape culture. Under the purity myth, any sexuality that deviates from a strict (generally straight, male-defined) norm is punishable by violence.

It’s not exactly news that women who transgress are punished (and there are certainly more consequences to the purity myth than sexual violence.) But we’re in a peculiar cultural place in the U.S. right now – where sexualized pop culture and a conservative movement to reinforce traditional gender roles are colliding to form a modernized virgin/whore complex. We’re getting abstinence-only education during the day and Girls Gone Wild commercials at night, and women are suffering as a result. Because whether it’s sexualized pop culture or abstinence class, the message is one and the same – that’s women’s sexuality is to be defined (and policed) by educators, legislators and media makers, not by women.

And overwhelmingly, what institutions want women to be is virginal. Pure. Innocent. Sure, they may demand that we perform sexuality – be visually appealing and always available for consumption - but a la Britney Spears, what is expected from women is sexy virginity. Be pure…for as long as I want you to.

Of course, at the heart of the purity myth is who gets positioned as “pure.” The perfect virgin as imagined in U.S. culture is sexy but not sexual. She’s young, white, and skinny. She’s a cheerleader, a babysitter; she’s accessible and eager to please. She’s never a woman of color - who are so hypersexualized in American culture that they’re rarely positioned as “the virgin.” She’s never a low-income girl, or a fat girl. She is never differently-abled. “Virgin” is a designate for those who fit into what a certain standard of women, especially younger women, are supposed to look like. The positioning one kind of girl as good and “clean,” of course, implies that the rest of us are dirty.

And if we’re not “pure,” or don’t want to be, our bodies are considered open for business.

For the rest of the essay, please check out the book!

Note: I'll be traveling today, so if I don't respond to comments right away, that's why! Looking forward to bitching will all of you...

Nine Questions About Dollhouse

1) Did you watch? What did you think?

2) Were you as psyched as I was to see that Mutant Enemy tag at the end?

3) How did you feel about Eliza D as Faith in Buffy? How have you felt about everything she's done since Buffy? What did you think about her performance as Echo?

4) Why the hell did Joss agree to work with Fox again? Or ever?

5) Um... are there still no people of color who want good roles in Hollywood? It's a real problem, isn't it? How on earth can we fix it, so that all the producers and directors aren't forced to only cast white people all the time? (Yes, there's Harry Lennix as Echo's handler, but a) that just makes him the token and b) Driving Miss Daisy, anyone?)

6) Ditto fat people, people with physical disabilities, people who aren't freakishly pretty, etc.?

7) Did they really have to start with the girl-is-broken-due-to-sex-abuse-and-requires-the-intervention-of-a-kind-man-to-seek-redemption plotline? Why is that never the secret weak spot for male action stars, huh?

8) If Person A is desperate and out of options, and is coerced into fully giving up her agency and identity, and if, after making that one decision, Person A no longer has any meaningful ability to consent to anything, nor does she have the ability to withdraw her consent from the original agreement -- under those circumstances, if Person C pays Person B money to have sex with Person A, is that really prostitution, as Joss and Eliza have said it is? Or is that sexual slavery?

9) Can someone tell me that Joss is going somewhere good with this? I want to believe...

By way of introduction...

Hello, lovely people. So honored to be bitching with you today - thanks for the hospitality!

Thought I'd introduce myself by sharing a short adapted excerpt from my essay in Yes Means Yes:

If you're a woman, wild sexual behavior isn't just "stupid," it's downright fucking dangerous. Not only can you "get yourself" raped, but you're also damn likely to find yourself blamed for it. After all, you should have known better.

I'm over the whole thing. Start to finish. And I hereby declare my right to be wild and still maintain my bodily autonomy.

Look, life is full of "stupid." Bungee jumping is stupid. Playing football is stupid. Running for president (even student body president) is stupid. Riding a motorcycle is stupid. Public speaking is stupid. Falling in love is stupid. Writing this essay is stupid. They're all likely to end in heartbreak, embarrassment, injury, or all of the above. But nobody except your mother is likely to try to talk you out of doing them, and no one, including your mother, is going to blame you or deny you the assistance you need to recover if, in the course of doing them, another person physically assaults you.

[...]

Scaring women into safety simply isn't making women safer -- and it never will. And there are other costs to asking women to police our own safety, beyond the basic and profound unfairness of the thing.

Like pleasure. Because I gotta tell you: Indulging your wild side can be pretty fun. That's why we do it. For the ecstasy of merging our bodies with the sweaty, throbbing crowd on a dance floor. For the thrill of meeting someone's eyes for the first time and indulging our desire to find out right now what their skin feels like. For the dizziness of drunken cameraderie. For the way the night air on our bare arms and legs raises goose flesh, our heart rate, and eyebrows, and reminds us what it feels like to be alive.

Sure, there are plenty of ways drinking and/or sexing can be bad for you -- any pleasure can be manipulated or abused for any number of reasons. But there's nothing inherently wrong with either, and when you force women to choose safety over pleasure in ways men never have to (and when you shame them for choosing "wrong"), you teach women that their pleasure is not as important as men's. And that's a slippery slope we all need to stop sliding down.

More bitching to come soon. Promise.

Hospitality

Just a quick announcement post to note that one or two fabulous bitches will be guest blogging tomorrow. Fierce feminists Jaclyn Friedman and Jess Valenti (I love it so much when people have their own wikipedia entries) will be stopping at Bitch headquarters on their virtual book tour. Yes Means Yes brings together a collection of essays on sexual identity, body image, the public discourse on rape, female sex work, sex ed, and so on. Together, these essays convey the enormous potential of a paradigm shift, one that focuses on women owning sexual identity and pleasure.

We don't know what the laydeez are going to blog about but we know they will here tomorrow. Please do bring the Bitchiest welcome you can muster.

Like You Don't Know My Name

Happy Valentine's Day!

I'm a long way from home and don't really have anyone round here to Valentine so I'm taking the liberty of asking you all to be my Valentine today. Cause, really, I'm a lover, not a fighter. Really.

I did make some calls home to check in with them that might accept my invitation.

You know what they say about absence making the heart grow fond, and so on? Pure dee bullshit, at least where the hearts concerned should be growing fonder about me.

Ring! Ring! Ring!

?Bueno?
Rosa, sweetheart! Happy Valentine's Day!
Who this is?
You know who this is. Its me, Taddy.
Taddy? Are you back?
No, I'm still in Wisconsin.
Cause I'm kind of busy right now.
Not too busy for me.
I have company.
What company? Who company?
Spooky's here. We're just leaving to go out.
You're going out with Spooky?
He's taking me to dos Hermanos.
You're going out with Spooky?
Then we're going to see the Frost/Nixon movie.
You're going out with Spooky?
You should see the roses he brought me. Roses for Rosa, he said. Isn't that sweet?
You're going out with Spooky?
Can't wait to see you again. Call me when you get back.
You're going out with Spooky?
Gotta go. Miss you, baby!

Well, there's more than one onion in the Porter stew.

Ring! Ring! Ring!

Hello?
Toni! Darlin! Happy Valentine's Day!
Who is this?
Its me, Taddy.
Oh my God, Taddy! Where are you?
Well, you know, I'm in Wisconsin. But I've been missing you and wanted to be your Valentine.
Thanks, baby. I don't have time to talk now, though. I've got to go.
Go? Where you got to go?
Rainy's coming over. We're going to San J for the weekend.
You're what?
Going to San J.
For the weekend?
Well, yeah.
Baby, I thought we had an understanding.
Well, of course we do. You know how I feel about you.
So, why you going with Rainy?
Well, I can still have fun, can't I?
No! No fun! Especially with Rainy. You can be with me or you can have fun. Not both.
Taddy, you so silly. I gotta go baby. Call me when you get back.

Ring! Ring! Ring!

Hello?
Cele! Happy Valentine's Day darlin!
Sam?
Sam? Stop messin. Its me, Taddy.
Oh, hey Taddy. Sorry. I was just expecting a call from Sam.
Yeah? Well, I know Sam. Not much of a talker. You're much better off talking with me.
Uh-huh. Well, I... Hold on, I got another call on the two-way. Just a sec...
Taddy, that's Sam on the other line. Was there something you wanted?
No, nothing in particular. Just miss you, that's all.
Ah, sweetie, I miss you too. When you coming home?
Can't say for sure. Probably be here a couple more months.
That long?
Yeah, but you know what they say about absence.
What do they say?
Forget it. I'll talk to you later. Say hi to that big bucket of chicken for me.
Who?
Sam!
Oh. OK. Bye. Call me when you get back.

So, dear readers. You can see I'm saving my love for you!

Its, me. Taddy.

PSA

The notion of being "entitled to your opinion" is complete bullshit. Sure, you can have an opinion. You can judge someone you've never met and rant about how they deserve scorn. It's not illegal. But that doesn't mean your judgments, your opinions are immune from criticism.

You hear this all the time from people. Free speech! First Amendment! Bullshit. Listen up. You have the right to speak. You do not have the right for people not to call you an asshole for the opinions you express while exercising your right to speak (a right which, by the way, has nothing to do with the First Amendment. The First Amendment protects certain kind of speech from government interference. It has nothing do with, say, blog conversations).

Old Friends, Identity

Last night I met up with a junior-high friend that I haven't seen since she moved away in 1994. That's right, fourteen years ago. I really haven't had the occasion to meet up with someone that I knew a long time ago, maybe ever. I'm not that great at keeping up with old friends, and I should really be better about it. I guess also I'm sometimes worried that if I meet a person I used to really like, they'll end up being lame and I'll be disappointed or disabused.

But it was incredibly fun. We sat in the restaurant for over three hours reminiscing, arguing, and laughing our asses off. It really was one of the best times I've had a while, perhaps because I didn't know what to expect. And as I drove home down Lake Shore Drive, I was contemplative. The whole evening she kept laughing at me and telling me how I was so exactly the same as she remembered and exactly how she pictured I'd be when i grew up. And that I hadn't changed a bit. Which is of course, not true--I've aged a lot, I've grown up, I look different, everything has changed except that I'm still loud and opinionated and idealistic. But the idea that there could be something fundamentally the same about 26-year-old-me and 13-year-old me was incredibly satisfying and comforting. I can't quite figure out why this is.

Perhaps it's the idea of some kind of personal essence. But I don't believe in souls. Yet I do believe in identity. I've had an experience like this before. When I was just starting law school, I went to visit my dad. I had relatively recently gotten out of a long and fairly problematic relationship, moved to a new city and made new friends and tried to change my life. And when I went through my old papers and momentos and letters from high school, I was shocked to find that I was the same, five or six years later, as I was then. I had been worried that the relationship I was in had fundamentally changed me somehow, that I had erased part of my identity, and that hadn't really happened at all.

I don't really have such fears now, but that feeling, that I had some kind of recognizable identity that was very plain to other people, an identity transcending incredible personal change and challenge, was surprisingly welcome.

I don't have any real understanding here. I just think it was an interesting response to a fairly pedestrian observation ("you haven't changed a bit!") and I'm wondering if other people have thoughts on why people say this, and why we're glad to hear it.

Punching Bags

This is going to be way less elaborate and well-articulated than it merits, but I'm throwing it up in a hurry.

I am horrified at the vitriol being directed at Nadya Suleman.

I am shocked at the disgust that oozes from Anne Curry in this interview.

I can almost only laugh at the sneering speculation of celebrity worship within a media platform that also has "Alec Baldwin mocks Joquain Phoenix" and "Madonna nude sells" also on its front page.

Appalled, but not surprised, by the death threats.

Why not surprised? Because single moms and poor people are the country's favorite punching bags. Oh, and because who doesn't love a good dose of micromanagement of strangers' reproductive choices on the side. We are, on the other hand, quite comfortable with childhood turned into a consumable entertainment product. Better kids be commodified and marketed than be supported with public funds.

America, you are not entitled to be outraged by a stranger's decisions about her uterus.

bitchy black history month post

i'm trying to think of an appropriate post for black history month, but i am tapped out. (*you* try jumping through federal hoops for a fucking earmark, oh, i'm sorry - pork.) i wrote one for work, instead.

shorter ding's post for work: since most people are so ignorant about basic american history, period, they need to shut the frak up about how black history month is unnecessary.

(sometimes badly implemented but not unnecessary.)

there. that's my black history month post.

Generalized Bitching

It's really fucking hard to do one's job well and with enthusiasm when one knows one's job is going to end in 3 months, inevitably. I mean, maybe it's not hard if your job is being in a Broadway play. But teaching is hard when you can't see past the end of the semester.

And when you have 2 new preps, both sort of outside your field, because you are dumb and you think they will enhance your CV. I don't feel like learning new books, y'all. I really don't.

You know what else I don't feel like? Having a student in my class who missed the first 3 weeks of class and then, when asked via email if he intends to get himself off the roster, replies by explaining that he suffered a concussion recently which makes it hard for him to make it places on time. Or email me apparently, but that part was only implied. If you read between the lines real hard.

I am a bitch, I know.

Also, the goddamn city dug up my front lawn today and shut off the water for the afternoon with no notice or anything. Apparently they can do that. Daughter is fascinated by enormous hole, loosely filled with red clay. Red clay which will be tracked all over the house for the foreseeable future.

Also, I thought I was strong enough to get rid of the cable TV but network programming bites. And without anything to watch on TV I just keep pissing around with work all night.

I don't really know what my position is on the stimulus, which makes me feel dumb. But not dumb enough to overcome my lazy.

And I feel like I have been waiting for my Girl Scout cookies - only Tagalongs at my house; thanks to a friend's brilliant re-naming, we call them JumpStart Crackers - FOREVER.

So. Crabby.

Its Like Fallin Down Into Muddy Water

For the second time since 2006, my brother's oldest son is off to occupy Iraq.

He's an infantryman in the 1/128 of the Wisconsin National Guard 32nd Brigade Combat Team. He and 3329 of his comrades are being sent to join the army of occupation. Its the largest callup of Wisconsin troops to a combat theater since 1945.

What is the major malfunction here? We voted to bring our soldiers home. Seems like these Wisconsin troops are headed the wrong way.

I don't see any reason to prolong the occupation but I go along with the slogan of the recent campaign to be as careful getting out of Iraq as we were reckless getting in.

The operative words, however, are getting out.

My nephew is not getting out. He's going back. Why? Where is the excercise of care? Where is the getting out?

dubya issued orders in September to dispatch the 32nd Brigade to Iraq. In November, the American people voted to countermand dubya's orders. So, lets get on with it.

Worries about renewed outbreak of factional warfare in Iraq may be valid or they may be misplaced. In any event, how is that our problem? How is that my family's problem? How is it my nephew's problem?

Seems to me like its the Iraqi's problem. And the problem of their neighbors. Seems to me like they should concentrate on their problems and leave us to concentrate on ours.

If the Iraqis need help, let them apply for assistance in the usual manner. Petition the Security Council. Raise the issue with international organizations. Disarm their militia. Remonstrate with the Saudis.

If they want the Wisconsin National Guard, petition the Governor of Wisconsin. If they want my nephew, drop me an e-mail.

I have to warn, though, I will not look favorably on any request. My family has plans for him. They do not include doing for Iraq what Iraq can't do for itself.

Cause we are out of there.

Bitching about moving

Tonight is the first night in the new house--OUR new house--after a week of packing shit and schlepping it, one pickupload at a time, over here. Mostly in the rain.

Not that I did any of it, mind. I was out of town all last week, so Mr. B did the honors. He had some help from his work buddies on Friday, and my mom was hanging out to keep PK out of the way, but even so I think my husband has had something like four hours of sleep a night.

Plus adventures! He'd stored several plastic bins full of books and papers outside, covered with a tarp to keep out the rain. You know what happened. Now there are hundreds of books and pictures and newspaper clippings and PK art works drying on every available surface.

Today the city was to turn the water on. We checked repeatedly all day, but nope: dry faucets. It just so happens that PK was home from school today with a snotty head cold. No water = no hand washing = germs and snot everywhere. Guess the new house has been broken in already.

At about 5, when it became clear the water guy wasn't going to make it today and we'd have to grub it overnight and call the city tomorrow morning, Mr. B went out to double-check, only to fund that the water HAD been turned on. So then we spent half an hour or so looking for the main line whatchamacallit.

Guess what happened after the water went on?

The toilet overflowed.

Tomorrow the plumber comes over (this was happening anyway--we have to repipe the place) and supposedly the internet starts working. I look forward to blogging while taking a long, well-deserved crap.

All Hope Lost

God. Fucking. Damnit.

They're never going to stop making these movies, are they?

Mi Sangre por Ti Dare Yo

My friends! !Mis amigos! Been missing me?

Cause I've been missing you all. Like, a lot.

For the last little while I've been walkabout. The next month or so I'll be settled at my mother's house. I got the high speed hookup installed here and expect to get back to some chicken fried blogging pretty quick. We've got some catching up to do.

Right now, I'm kind of homesick. Which is odd, when you think about it. Homesick. In my mother's house.

But I'm homesick for the Four Corners. So it was nice to get a care package from Rey (that's him, with the hat, waving the flag in the photo) yesterday. He sent me some DVD's and some family photos and a jar of nopalitos.

Rey's my best friend. We meet a couple times a week for breakfast. I usually have huevos a la mexicana con chorizo y nopales. He was worried I wouldn't get any nopales here.

He shouldn't worry. There are six kinds of chiles in the local grocery. And two kinds of avocate. And three brands of corn tortilla. Here. Sixty miles south of Lake Superior.

Damn, you got to love this country. Now, if we could just displace the whiny Greenwood anthems with patriotic hymns more like this, our love could be complete.

Weekend tip

That last post was way more generative of debate than I expected it to be. Makes me relieved that I wasn't blogging back when we were deciding to let the baby cry it out.

Anyway, I wanted something else at the top now, so here's an anecdote:

Tonight I was tweezing my eyebrows while my daughter was bathing, as is my wont. I've never had my eyebrows waxed and only recently realized I am the only one of my female peers to not do so, which has made me feel reflective about this particular hair removal ritual (I am totally fascinated by women's stories about hair removal; every woman I know has A Memory about the first time she shaved her legs. Save my friends who have never done so). Tonight I had a flash of a memory I had buried: in my Catholic middle school, we once a week bused to the local public school for gender segregated shop and home ec classes. My home ec class was taught by this 8o year old woman who mostly taught us how to sew aprons, but who one day gave a lesson in eyebrow plucking. She taught us to take a pencil and line it up at a 45 degree-ish angle next to our pupils, extending up into the bridge of the nose area. "Any hair," she informed us, "that falls outside the pencil must be removed!" I remember going home that day and sizing it up, feeling relived that I wasn't endowed with too many rogue hairs.

What an absurd thing to learn in school.

Peeve

I am pretty laid back in the classroom. I joke with my students, I talk about football, my weekend activities, share personal anecdotes. I like them to do the same. I often wear jeans to class. I don't really care what they call me (although since I have graduated, if they ask what to call me, I say 'what would you call me if I were 10 yrs older and a man?' They always chose to call me Dr. Vane after that, without my ever saying I prefer it). I accept their facebook friend requests. I swear. And so on. My classrooms are generally comfortable places.

And yet I become incensed when my students email me and open with the salutation, "Hey." As in, "Hey, I am just writing to see what the reading is." Or, "Hey can you tell me how many sources we need." It makes me completely crazy.

My question, bitches, is am I being an asshole about this? Does a certain level of informal conduct intuitively invite extremely casual email address? Or am I right in feeling that written communication with a professor merits a more implicitly respectful approach? I really hate to be hierarchically stuffy so I'd like to begin disabusing myself of the notion that they should email me more formally if the readership deems it appropriate.

international relations

clearly, i've hit the mental wall at work today.
so, to cheer me up, my norwegian Roomie sent me this:

YouTube - Norwegians Got Soul

who needs economic stimulus/recovery discussions when you have strapping norwegians and a black lady dancing around what looks like the Reagle Beagle?

happy wednesday, people.

dickensian horror

I've got no time to get into the ins and outs of this stimulus package.
But the GOP version is here and the Senate version is here.

There is a question I have, however:
What would your state look like without stimulus funds?

Once you think about that for a bit, take a moment and call your Senator.

(Illinois has a now estimated $4 billion deficit and lost over 76k jobs in the past two months, with more likely to come. I know what we'd look like.)

Just Say No

I'm late to this on account of The Greatest Franchise in the History of Sports, but Thomas Benton's Chronicle piece on why no one should go to grad school in the humanities is not to be missed. The occasion of prospective graduate students visiting my institution this week has me wanting to pass out flyers that read,

[Prospective PhD's have] been praised their whole lives, and no one has ever told them that they may not become what they want to be, that higher education is a business that does not necessarily have their best interests at heart. Sometimes they accuse me of being threatened by their obvious talent. I assume they go on to find someone who will tell them what they want to hear: "Yes, my child, you are the one we've been waiting for all our lives." It can be painful, but it is better that undergraduates considering graduate school in the humanities should know the truth now, instead of when they are 30 and unemployed, or worse, working as adjuncts at less than the minimum wage under the misguided belief that more teaching experience and more glowing recommendations will somehow open the door to a real position.

Uh huh. Preach it.

Other highlights:

[M]ost prospective graduate students have given little thought to what will happen to them after they complete their doctorates. They assume that everyone finds a decent position somewhere, even if it's "only" at a community college (expressed with a shudder). [...] Their motives are usually some combination of the following:

* They are excited by some subject and believe they have a deep, sustainable interest in it. (But ask follow-up questions and you find that it is only deep in relation to their undergraduate peers — not in relation to the kind of serious dedication you need in graduate programs.)

* They received high grades and a lot of praise from their professors, and they are not finding similar encouragement outside of an academic environment. They want to return to a context in which they feel validated.

* They are emerging from 16 years of institutional living: a clear, step-by-step process of advancement toward a goal, with measured outcomes, constant reinforcement and support, and clearly defined hierarchies. The world outside school seems so unstructured, ambiguous, difficult to navigate, and frightening.

* With the prospect of an unappealing, entry-level job on the horizon, life in college becomes increasingly idealized. They think graduate school will continue that romantic experience and enable them to stay in college forever as teacher-scholars.

* They can't find a position anywhere that uses the skills on which they most prided themselves in college. They are forced to learn about new things that don't interest them nearly as much. No one is impressed by their knowledge of Jane Austen. There are no mentors to guide and protect them, and they turn to former teachers for help.

* They think that graduate school is a good place to hide from the recession. They'll spend a few years studying literature, preferably on a fellowship, and then, if academe doesn't seem appealing or open to them, they will simply look for a job when the market has improved. And, you know, all those baby boomers have to retire someday, and when that happens, there will be jobs available in academe.

Umm. Yeah. Sound familiar? Sure as shit does to me. The piece describes me then and it describes me now - 30, dreadfully underpaid, about to be unemployed. Then comes the really damning part:

Unfortunately, during the three years that I searched for positions outside of academe, I found that humanities Ph.D.'s, without relevant experience or technical skills, generally compete at a moderate disadvantage against undergraduates, and at a serious disadvantage against people with professional degrees. [...] What almost no prospective graduate students can understand is the extent to which doctoral education in the humanities socializes idealistic, naïve, and psychologically vulnerable people into a profession with a very clear set of values. It teaches them that life outside of academe means failure, which explains the large numbers of graduates who labor for decades as adjuncts, just so they can stay on the periphery of academe.

Benton goes on to list a few conditions under which it might be a decent decision to pursue a PhD in the humanities (you are independently wealthy, you have a partner who can provide all income and health insurance,you are connected to academic superstars, etc). At this point, my position is that not even those conditions are good enough. If you are spending this month considering entering grad school in the humanities, I implore you, DO NOT GO. Not even if you have a partner with a stable income (as I did when I began) and especially not if you are a woman in a hetero relationship who worries about equity of earning potential/labor within the partnership (this is what I know; not trying to be exclusionary).

Don't go if you care about being part of a professional community that has systematically worked to improve conditions for its workforce while continually refining its ideals and goals.
Don't go if you have a tendency to become emotionally invested in sync with intellectually invested, if you find it hard to divest yourself of things you have spent a lot of time on.
Don't go if you are thinking of your graduate studies as an extension of your personality, as something that is an inevitable outgrowth of who you are and what you care about.
Don't go because you think having your passion be your work is the kind of equivalence facilitated by graduate work.

I promise there is something else you can do, and do well. You owe it to yourself to try to find out what that is.

randomness

Okay, first, jeez people, overheat interiors much?

Kvetching over. Sadly I am not an ealy enough riser to have made it in for the morning plenary, but doubtless my co-panellist Liza at Culture Kitchen (culturekitchen.com) will be blogging the earlier events, so surf on over to her joint to find out what I missed. Or try the main conference site: fem2pt0.com.

I love these feminist gatherings, which always amuse me with the recognition that I am actually middle aged! Most of the women here are so young and styling and have such bright, focused faces. Generally Iove bringing PK along, because what little boy (or girl) wouldn't benefit from being surrounded by smart energetic attractive women? But not this time; I left him home because Mr. B really needs an 8-year old around to help him move house all by himself (yes, I have guilt). (And no, he's not entirely alone; my mom's there for the week to do the PK-related activities, and Mr. B's work buddies have volunteered to help him with the actual load-and-transport part of moving. But still.)

Anyhoo. Plenary is letting out in a minute, and the sessions start shortly after that. Let the live-blogging commence.

(If any readers are here, I'm wearing a teal-colored wrap dress and green-framed librarian glasses, and carrying a red coat with a too-warm fur collar (because I hate animals) and a terribly fashion-forward Starbucks bag as a purse.

And for you, madame?

For the next week, I'm just going to steal Jesse Taylor's ideas and write about them here, mmkay? He writes:

But for some reason, the idea that one person is paying for two people’s meals sets off some retrograde bomb in a server’s head that always make me the magnet for anything financial, presumably with a mop and knitting needles soon to come thereafter for my dining companion.

This is actually one widely-complained-of experience by the feminists of the world that I can not relate to. Sure, it's happened to me a few times, but usually I find that the check is put right in the middle, or conveniently handed back to the person who is doing the paying. The only time I can remember the check being initially handed directly to my boyfriend is about a year ago, when he took me out for a rather nice dinner at a French Restaurant to celebrate something or other (the meal was absolutely delicious, by the way). I think he was chummy with the waitress, who was charming, and ordering wine and such, and so he was the "man" of the evening and I the "date." I liked our waitress. He was, in fact, paying for the meal. So I didn't mind, but I did notice, because it's not the way it usually happens.

I don't know how I got this way, but I seem to be usually the dominant person, at a meal. Multiple instances of traveling with boyfriends to foreign lands where I knew a bit of the the language—and they did not—make me very comfortable not only ordering the appetizers and the drinks, but often their meal as well. And often we go to restaurants where we don't each order an entree, but order two to share (very common routine at Chinese and Indian restaurants). And so it seems silly, after we've had a lengthy discussion where we decide what we will be having, for me, who gets to order first because I am the "lady", to just name one of the two entrees we've decided on, neither of which I think of as "my order."

When you are the one doing the ordering, and calling the server over for x, y, or z, and asking for the check, they generally know to bring you the check. So I advise all of you out there who are tired of the server handing the date your check to take over a little. If you order the meal, and do the most interacting with the server (i.e. respond when they are doing the "how is everything" rounds), they will bring the check to you. Which is good for me, 'cause I pay a lot.

The one exception to my dominant restaurant personality is sushi. Since my dude is adventurous with the sushi and I am a little timid, I usually let him order an array of stuff so I can expand my sushi repertoire. It also feels delightfully retrograde from the way we usually do things, and I occasionally enjoy just sitting back and being surprised by what shows up. But when we do that, you can bet your ass they bring him the check.

Six-burgh!!

Y'all, how awesome?

This is my last football post till next season, but I can't resist because the game was SO AWESOME. There were some problems, obv - too many penalties, sort of weak defensive showing, occasionally scandalously bad red zone performance - but overall a completely thrilling game.

Sports commentators like to blather about how well Steelers' fans travel; almost any game is a home game. Partly true, they do travel to games very often because it's so damn hard to get a ticket to Heinz Field. But the more determinant issue, to my mind, is that Pittsburgh is a town people leave. I did it. A lot of my friends did it. The sense I have of how many of us feel about it is that we wish we had realized how much we loved it before we left. We felt like the smart successful ones when we moved out of dodge; now we feel like the friends we left behind might have been the smart ones. Pittsburgh shrinks. And gets older. But the Pittsburgh diaspora has little impact on commitment to the team. Steelers' fans fill the seats at away games because most of them left their moms and grandmas back in McKeesport. And professional sports franchises, for all their gross spectacle and blinding materialism and culture of misogyny, are, at their best, about place and connection to place. And for a host of reasons, I know of no pro franchise that better embodies a sense of place than the Steelers. The reasons given for this are always hackneyed and involve things that are not untrue (blue-collar, hard-working, family ownership, fierce involvement in community, etc) but which do not, in their sum, amount to the pull the team has for me.

Yea, sports are escapism. I certainly have been using the Superbowl ramp up to distract me from the fact that the job for which I got a campus interview is having funding problems and may disappear. Because holy shit, I could cry for a month when I really stop to think about that.

But sports are very much about being present as well, present to one's past and one's place, if the connection is there. For the entirety of the game last night, we hap my laptop open and video-chat connected to friends in Pittsburgh. They were on a bit of a delay so we would see their reaction a split second after we had our own; it was so great. To cheer and then turn and watch your friends in your hometown cheer at the same thing. It felt like when you are watching a major speech on TV and the coverage occasionally switches to a roomful of people in Los Angeles or New York or Atlanta or Chicago. That's supposed to connect you, right?

I know this is ridiculously earnest, but it's been a tough 6 months for me. Or 12 months. Maybe 18. And I feel completely placeless within the profession. And I wanted to share one last time why this sport in particular makes me feel grounded and like I know something about myself.

Movin' and shakin'

Not to be confused with shaking and bacon, you understand. It's a balmy winter morning in Bmore ( you whining east-coasters LIED) and I'm cheerily waiting for the train (you civilized east-coasters ROCK) to take me into DC for today's Feminism 2.0 conference. Sorry for the lack of proper linkage, but I have renounced lugging laptops now that I have the freedom of an iphone, despite the lack of cut-and-pasteing.

So! I shall blog the awesome feminist excitement (I'm on a panel with NOW's Kim Gandy!) periodically throughout the day. Check the tweets over in the sidebar, too. I couldn't be more chuffed about this whole thing.

(PS to Max: I know I should have emailed you. I suck. Suffice to say that when I landed last night I had no idea where I'd be staying, and that 72 hours ago I had the wrong date for the conference itself, even. Travel arrangements this time out have not been my strong suit.)