Married Men & the Holidays

What is it about married men, and women for that matter, that makes them more antsy during the holiday season? I cannot count the number of “hey sexy’s” I’ve received over the past five or so years from random x’s, old high school friends  and flings, etc. during the holiday season.

They say married men are the happiest people alive, followed by single women, single men, then married women. So what makes them want to go out and seek something “more” during the holidays? Is it that their wives are too busy wrapping and cooking pies to pay attention to them? Are they nostalgic for their younger, more playful years? Or are they just tired of playing Santa Claus – stressed about the financial burdon of the holidays, and wishing for something more? Maybe it’s that they have time off during the holiday season. They hope to make one special, secret, Christmas wish just for themselves.

I’m not sure what it is.

I know I’m feeling pretty antsy these days myself. I think it’s that I’m lonely. Even here, in blog land, I feel like I’m writing to myself. No one is reading what I’m writing, so sometimes, it’s hard to not feel like “what’s the point?” Somewhere under all that crumpled wrapping paper is a sadness. It’s something that all the gifts, eggnog, and even warm chocolate chip cookies in the world can’t feed fast enough.

No one asks grown ups what we want for Christmas. If they do, it’s the obligatory ask. It’s the “what do I HAVE to get you to make you happy” ask. It’s not the soul-searching kind of ask: What would really FILL you this holiday season? What would warm your heart?

I don’t think we even bother to ask ourselves what we want. We just go through the motions. There are lists to check off, Susie added that last minute gift she’s just DYING for, and – of course - there are those pies to bake.

I was scanning the Craigs List classified today in shear bordom. I was saddened (but hopeful in a misery loves company sort of way) to find that I”m far from alone in feeling extra lonley during the holiday season. There, I found dozens of postings by people who will be alone this year on Christmas. It’s depressing.

I won’t be alone, but I will feel alone. It won’t be any different than most days and nights are for me. I’ll go through the motions and I’ll hope my children are too occupied with their gifts to notice. I’ll put on a good show and try not to get extra sappy or emotional at the small things.

Maybe it’s normal to feel this way. Maybe there just ISN’T a Santa Claus and it’s about time I figured it out. Maybe all those Santas out there are just looking for a five minute hop on Santa’s lap and have very little interest in anything else. I’m really not sure.

I don’t have time – just like I don’t have time to really figure out what I”d like for Christmas this year – to feel sorry for myself. There are veggie trays to put out, eggs to boil, and last minute presents to wrap. Tonight, I’ll look up to the stars and thank God for all that I do have in my life. And pray that a Christmas Angel is up there, somewhere, knowing what to send me.

Happy Holidays to all. I hope none of you feel alone this Christmas season! And if you do? I sure know a girl who’d love to keep ya company…

(You know where to find me).

-Yellow Doll

Why I think I may be a Lesbian, Dr. Minor & Other Ramblings

Dr. William Minor was a madman. He murdered a man, not in cold blood, but in a psychotic state. He spent his life in an asylum. He was mad, in every sense of the word, even cutting off his penis to cleanse himself of past sins (such as obsessive masturbation). Dr. Minor was also a genius. His mind, in fact, was credited to writing a bulk of the Oxford English Dictionary.

Had it not been for Minor’s crime and inability to leave the asylum, there may never have been the full version of the Oxford English Dictionary – perhaps one of the greatest print undertakings of its time (a period spanning the early 1900s to around 1927).

I’ve found myself thinking about women lately. The smoothness of their skin, the scent of them, the way they buck their hips forward when a man (or woman for that matter) moves to taste them. Ever the feminist, I am somewhat surprised that I’ve never  had the experience of being in love with another woman.

A part of me thinks the reason Dr. Minor was able to stay so intent on his work helping to define over 400,000 words, is because he was in love with Professor James Murray (the spearhead of the Oxford dictionary project). While both Murray and Minor claimed to be straight, I’m not so sure I believe it. And a part of me wonders if it was the guilt over his feelings for Murray that propelled Minor to chop off  his penis.

Anne H. had an affair with Ellen that spanned over three years. She ultimately left Ellen because she felt that she wasn’t “allowed” to have other friends and associations within the context of that lesbian relationship. Ellen simply said “I don’t want a girlfriend who wants those things,” speaking Anne’s request for more personal space and friends of both sexes. Anne, it turns out, wound up with a man.

I wonder, was Anne even bisexual? Or was Ellen a temp band-aid to the years of abuse Anne’s father had put her through as a child? Was she, in fact, straight?

Sexuality is such a confusing thing. At least, for me it is. I have heard that many “hardcore gays” don’t believe there is a such thing as bisexuality. Part of me believes that. Most of me doesn’t.

The fact is that I’ve always been attracted to both sexes. The grace and natural beauty of a woman is something that could never be compared to the hardness of a man’s body. The strip clubs I’ve been to have made me yearn to touch a woman in the most intimate of ways. And I’ve often found myself jealous of men – their ease at being able to be with a woman.

It’s not easy for a “straight” or “bi curious” woman to meet other women. Lesbians scoff at us, saying they don’t want to be anyone’s experiment. I don’t blame them for that. I can see how they would feel that way. At the same time, men have only one reaction when you tell them you think you are bisexual. Yep: (you guessed it) THREESOME!

I heard somewhere that one in three women confess to having fantasies about being with other women. Where are these women?

I once had a threesome. Make that a foursome. It was with a boyfriend and his younger brother. But more importantly, it was with his longtime “homegirl” (that’s how they referred to one another – something I felt was a little off putting but let slide by the mere virtue of her enormous tits). We went down on her, side to side. We took turns licking her and touching her. I loved kissing her and sucking on her nipples. I les. I haven’t been able to put her out of my mind for years.

Lately, I’ve begun talking to a woman whom I’m very interested in. However, I don’t know if it will ever “go there” because I’m entirely too self conscious to take it a step further with her. We have never met in person – only having met through personal ads. (She placed it, I responded). She is a goddess, I can see, through the pictures she’s shared with me. But my innate confidence that is natural for me with men (who seem to be so much easier and less complicated when it comes to getting them aroused) is entirely missing when it comes to this woman.

My thighs are too fat. My stomach hangs too low (a side effect from childbirth). My face now has wrinkles. And I’m surely, just overall, too fat, to be with her.

I know it’s ridiculous.

I have been posting on a site called Lesbian Memoirs. There, I have met some of the nicest women you could possibly think to meet. These women have embraced me and my uncertain sexuality. These women feel like family to me. They are encouraging and they never judge. They are what I always thought lesbians would be.

I have been assured, by this woman, that she’s more interested in a mental connection than a physical one and that she is, indeed, interested in me in a sexual way. But something inside of me tells me different.

Is it that the women I’ve known are naturally catty? Or is it something else? I’m not sure.

I’ve never had many female friends and I’ve always felt competition over men around them. I grew up with no sisters and a strained relationship with m mother. Sometimes, I wonder if that’s what this is all about – having nothing to do with what is feeling like an overwhelming desire to eat pussy these days.

Women don’t have penis’s to cut off. Maybe, if I did, I’d better understand where Dr. Minor was coming from. Afterall, it’s hard for me not to feel a kinship with a crazy, word-loving mad man. He and I are not that different, after all…

The Many Hearts of Sylvia Plath

I just finished reading Wintering: a novel of Sylvia Plath, by Kate Moses. What a great read! Today’s Time Out! topic, being obvious. Today, I write about my hero: Sylvia.

Sylvia was the first of the Literary Mama’s. A genius and forward thinker for her time, she managed to do it all. Here’s a woman who grappled with depression while raising a family, being a wife, and becoming a successful writer.

I’ve always had an interest in Sylvia. But what I learned in reading Wintering has really made me feel even closer to her. Did you know that Sylvia used to go around painting little hearts on her furniture? I still go around doing these things (except, for me, it’s daisies). I thought I was the only one. A woman who wore her heart on her sleeve, she sure was shouting it out to the world: “I just want to be loved!”

The critiques say that Wintering shows what Ted put up with in his marriage to the chronically depressed Sylvia. Phoey! Sure, there are a few moments where she snaps his head off (and didn’t she have the right? The man ran off with an Elizabeth Taylor 3rd marriage plus hussy!) But over all, Wintering depicts Ted as the second fiddle writer and literary figure that he, indeed, was.

I wonder how far Sylvia would have gotten if it hadn’t been for Ted’s affair. I wonder if she would have put out more novels like Bell Jar or more poetry collections. I wonder if she would have eventually taken her work to the silver screen. I wonder if he would have collapsed in jealousy? I like to think he’d beg her to take him back – only to be rebuffed.

Why is it that all the great ones die so young? Or, is it that, in dying young, they force us to look twice at the short-spanned legacies they leave behind? Are we so attention deficited that we can’t focus on a longer lifespan for a Lifetime Achievement Award?

I used to wonder how she could have left her children in that flat, laying on her kitchen floor. What if they had found her? What if they had frozen to death or starved to death? What if her neighbor “friend” hadn’t discovered what she’d done? I used to have a peice of myself that hated her for that: Definitely not Literary Mama style! But, after reading Wintering, I have more sympathy for her plight. The fact was that she was entirely alone in the world during the time leading up to her death.

I plan to be entirely alone tommorrow. I plan to deal with the blows I’ve been facing lately – Cushings, life with an alcoholic, depression, disappointments, etc. – in a way that celebrates me! I wonder if Sylvia had done this from time to time – if, perhaps, her children weren’t so young when Ted left, she would have found enough juice to recharge herself with days like this.

I never knew the woman, yet I feel compelled to take a day trip tomm to her Northhampton residence. It’s not that far of a drive and it might be fun. I could bring my camera and sit and write. I wonder who lives there now? I think I have just enough gas to get away with it too. Maybe I could swing by the butterfly place on my way home. Maybe that’s how I’ll spend my “Me-Day.” Me, and Sylvia. Does it get any better?

I’m off to bed, with, of course, a copy of Ariel…

Goodnight, Sylvia. Sleep well. You are loved and you are missed.

“Poetry is the bloodjet. There is no stopping it.”

Cushings Disease, a Missing Cat & More

Angus, our one-year-old kitten, seems to have gone missing. We haven’t seen him since last Saturday night. This wouldn’t be as scary as it is if we didn’t live in New England. There have been many nights where it’s nearly zero. I’m not holding out much hope for the poor little guy.

I’m slowly recovering from the Cushings diagnosis, but haven’t been up for the Time Out! project. I guess I’ll chalk it up to a false start and put it on my New Year’s “to do” list.

I see the doctor in the morning for my first shots for Cushings. I’m hoping that these shots will make it so I can go off the steroids all together. I’m starting to look like a blow fish. I am avoiding mirrors like they are terrorists. A way to cope with this? Apparently, it’s to eat a whole bag of Cape Cod potato chips. (Well, they were 40 percent reduced fat, after all! What do you want from me?)

Was trying to think of someone to write about for Time Out! and thought it might be appropriate to do some research on Cushings himself. I mean, if a girl’s got to walk around with a man’s disease, she should at least know a little bit about him, right? Maybe, if he was a good guy, I can get his name tattooed on my ass…

Submitted my Lullaby poem to Literary Mama today. Am doing everything I can to shut up my inner skinny chick and my inner critic. It’s not working very well…

UPDATE: ADDED TWO DAYS LATER. ANGUS RETURNED HOME TODAY. JACOB SAYS HE PRAYED FOR HIM TO COME HOME LAST NIGHT. PERHAPS THERE IS SOMETHING TO BELIEVING…

My Cushy Lil Diagnosis

Today, I was diagnosed with Cushing’s disease. Now I know why I’ve been gaining weight like a maniac, etc. I knew nothing about this disease until today. The sad part is that it’s something I’ve likely had for years. This news is crushing me and I may need to take a few days off from the Time Out! Project. I’ll be back, though, rest assured…. Meantime, here’s some info I dug up…

What is Cushing’s?

Cushing’s syndrome, also known as hypercortisolism or hyperadrenocorticism, is an endocrine disorder caused by prolonged exposure of the body’s tissues to high levels of the hormone cortisol (in the blood) from a variety of causes, including primary pituitary adenoma (known as Cushing’s disease), primary adrenal hyperplasia or neoplasia, ectopic ACTH production (e.g., from a small cell lung cancer), and iatrogenic (steroid use). It is relatively rare and most commonly affects adults aged 20 to 50. An estimated 10 to 15 of every million people are affected each year. Cushing’s was discovered by American physician, surgeon and endocrinologist Harvey Cushing (1869-1939) and reported by him in 1932.

Normally, cortisol is released from the adrenal glands in response to ACTH being released from the pituitary gland. Both Cushing’s syndrome and Cushing’s disease are characterized by elevated levels of cortisol in the blood, but the cause of elevated cortisol differs between the two.

• Cushing’s disease specifically refers to a tumor in the pituitary gland that stimulates excessive release of cortisol from the adrenal glands by releasing large amounts of ACTH.
• In Cushing’s syndrome, ACTH levels will normally drop due to negative feedback from the high levels of cortisol. All forms of Cushing’s are correctly called Cushing’s Syndrome.

Cushing’s syndrome occurs when the body’s tissues are exposed to excessive levels of cortisol for long periods of time. Cortisol helps maintain blood pressure and cardiovascular function and is responsible for helping the body respond to stress. Many people suffer the symptoms of Cushing’s syndrome because they take steroids such as prednisone for asthma, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus and other inflammatory diseases, or for immunosuppression after transplantation. Prednisone is well-known for a “bloating” look that it gives people who take it.

Others develop Cushing’s syndrome because of overproduction of cortisol by the body due to a tumor on the pituitary (usually an adenoma or benign tumor of the pituitary glands) or adrenal glands, or elsewhere in the body Adrenal cancers, or other adrenal abnormalities may be the cause of Cushing’s Syndrome as well.

People who have been diagnosed with depression, alcoholism, malnutrition and panic attacks tend to have higher cortisol levels as well. These types of Cushing’s may be called Pseudo-Cushing’s.

Symptoms vary, but most people have upper body obesity (central obesity), rounded face (“moon face”), increased fat around the neck and on the back of the neck (buffalo hump), and thinning arms and legs. Children tend to be obese with slowed growth rates.

Other symptoms appear in the skin, which becomes fragile and thin. It bruises easily and heals poorly. Purplish pink stretch marks (striae) may appear on the abdomen, thighs, buttocks, arms and breasts. The bones are weakened, and routine activities such as bending, lifting or rising from a chair may lead to backaches, rib and spinal column fractures.

Most people have severe fatigue, weak muscles, persistent hypertension (due to the aldosterone-like effects) and insulin resistance, leading to hyperglycemia (high blood sugars) which can lead to diabetes mellitus. Patients frequently suffer various psychological disturbances, ranging from euphoria to frank psychosis. Depression and anxiety, including panic attacks, are common.

Women usually have excess hair growth (hirsutism) on their faces, necks, chests, abdomens, and thighs. Their menstrual periods may become irregular or stop (amenorrhoea). Men have decreased fertility with diminished or absent desire for sex.

Other symptoms include excess sweating, telangiectasia (dilation of capillaries, spider veins), atrophy of the skin (which gets thin and bruises easily) and other mucous membranes, proximal muscle weakness (hips, shoulders).

The excess cortisol may also affect other endocrine systems and cause, for example, reduced libido, impotence and infertility.

Untreated Cushing’s syndrome can lead to heart disease and increased mortality. Excess ACTH may also result in hyperpigmentation of the skin.

For a more complete list of Cushing’s Symptoms, see the Cushing’s Checklist. Many tests are done to determine if a person has Cushing’s. You can find a listing of them here.

Good Morning, Vietnam! (and Officer “Pork, the other white meat” Goodwin)

That’s how it feels today. I didn’t write about anyone last night for the Time Out! people project and so you can bet I’ll be blogging double time throughout the day and again later tonight. Instead, I worked on some of my memoir writing and read an amazing book about the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary.

I know, I know. Sounds like a boring read, right? Think again! The dictionary was actually written, in part, by a mad man who spent the majority of his life in a mental institution for the criminally insane! (Look it up, I’m not kidding!)

I thought this was absolutely fascinating (you can’t knock the geek out of a word freak). Maybe it’s no wonder that I am so attracted to words. After all, as Forrest Gump would say, “Crazy is as crazy does!”

I’m hoping to finish up the Christmas shopping this week. This will be a bit of a trick with doctors appointments, the pre vacation rush at work, and activities at the kids’ schools abound. But I’m happy to report that I’m nearly there! Broke, but nearly there. I wonder what the lady at the gas station thinks of me these days, buying my gas on quarters… I can’t be the only one.

I’m applying to Goddard for my MFA in creative writing and just finished my application essay. I’m thinking I may want to tone down the sexual references in it. Of course, they will allow for creative license in a creative writing program, and the story I am submitting does need the sexual content to make sense. But…

I got some heartfelt references for the program and am hopeful that I’ll be a shoe in. The trick is going to be financing it. Do you think grad school takes quarters? What about dimes – sticky ones from the bottom of the cup holder?

I’ll probably be paying my April court date traffic ticket with those dimes. So I guess I should be saving them.

Ok, here’s a person I can write about! Officer Goodwin. Keene Police Department. Keene, NH. Now HERE’S a real champion of a public servant if I ever heard of one!

A few months ago, I was making a mad dash with the kids to Main Street in Keene to sell off some old Backstreet Boys (I know, I know) CDs at the local pawn shop. I figured the ten cents per CD might buy us a few Dollar Menu double cheeseburgers before my son’s football banquet. Worth a shot, right?

Anyway, it was around 4:30 – it was 4:19 to be precise – when I pulled a U Turn on Main Street. I’d never been to this particular pawn shop before and I avoid the traffic loving Main Street as often as humanly possible. But on this afternoon, out of work early, and with a plan to make a small fortune on the 100s of CDs and DVDs piled into boxes in the Jeep, the kids and I were feeling brave. I happily pulled the U Turn when I spotted the pawn shop and – holy shit! in Keene? and on Main Street? – a parking spot.

My initial bliss turned to that dreaded feeling in the pit of my stomach when I saw the blue lights of a cruiser from my rearview mirror. Well, that’s no biggie. I wasn’t speeding. I must have a light out or something. Wait. Is it even dark enough for lights? I quickly checked my inspection sticker. Yep. All good. I wonder what he wants. “Jake! Do you have your seatbelt on?” “Yeah, Ma.” Check.

No sooner had I run my mental list of “Are you sure it’s me you are pulling over, officer?” when I was looking into the eyes of a very pissy Officer (Pork Chop, Bacon Breath, Bacon Bits) Goodwin. “License and registration, ma’am.” I didn’t argue, and handed him my documentation with a happy smile. I knew there had to be a mistake. I hadn’t done anything wrong.

Officer Goodwin went to his cruiser to check on the lengthy criminal record I was more than positive he would not find. He was gone a full twenty minutes, making a traffic back up on Main Street during what was becoming the end of the day rush hour. I kept my head low, hoping none of my co workers saw me and wondering what was taking him so long.

Main Street was getting crowded quickly. I’d forgotten that at 4:20 p.m. every day, the local college students, former vets, cancer patients, hippies, and well – just about everyone without a job in town, and even many with jobs – crowd the street holding signs for the legalization of marijuana. This movement had started a few weeks ago and participants had vowed to bring their pro-pot signs (and in some cases, paraphernalia and joints themselves) to the center of town. The would not stop, they insisted, until pot was legal in the Granite State. I was watching these people march up and down Main Street with their signs – thinking back to my own pot smoking days – and wondering if my kids understood what was going on.

Lost in thought, I was startled when Bacon Breath tapped on my window. He promptly handed me a ticket for $72 for pulling an illegal U Turn. I was baffled. There was no sign preventing a U Turn. I told him so, in a polite, God I hate former hall monitors with short man’s syndrome sort of way. He smirked, and pointed to the back of what he claimed to be a no U Turn sign.

Now, Bacon Breath could have cared less that I could not actually SEE the sign, because the only sign in front of me was one that said 4:2o Friendly! being held by a man in ripped jeans and a heavy flannel jacket. I wondered how long our neighborhood hippie had been standing there, blocking the sign from any one’s view. I tried to point this out to Pork Chop. He wasn’t impressed. Apparently, drivers on Main Street in Keene are expected to have X-ray vision and see THROUGH cardboard rally signs to the traffic signs they block.

You see, the rules in Keene are different from the rules in other places. Not only are you supposed to have X-ray vision, but, it’s more important to catch wild mothers on a pawn shop selling mission than it is to stop the people smoking weed in public on public streets at 4:20 in the afternoon.

Now, I’m not sure if I am for the legalization of marijuana or not. I frankly, don’t care! But what I am for is fairness here! The fact is that I could not see the sign because of a protester on the street. I don’t care whether that person was protesting pot laws or the war: It’s the police department’s duty to make sure that there is order and that drivers are safe and can navigate the roads safely regardless of who is protesting what. It’s also their job to uphold the law.

The law is that pot is illegal. Yet, it’s ok for hundreds of people to gather on public land and smoke it. But it’s not ok for me – with no criminal record and only one speeding ticket on the books (which I was totally guilty of) – to make an honest error?

I’m thinking Pork Chop (like many cops I know) was too afraid to deal with the real issue at hand that day and felt it better (and easier) to pick on the little lady with the smile than it was to deal with the potheads. It was, after all the end of the month and he had his quota to make.

But it gets even BETTER ladies and gents!

A week later, I’m sitting in my house late at night (we’re talking 11:30 here). Everything is quiet and the only people up are my oldest son and I. We’re watching a movie in the living room. I’m falling asleep (nothing new, I can’t ever seem to stay awake for movies). Suddenly, my 12-year-old SCREAMS, “MOM! WAKE UP! THERE’S SOMEONE SHINING FLASHLIGHTS INTO OUR WINDOWS!”

I about shit myself.

There’s nothing like being the primary weapon for your family’s safety and protection. You know you’re a wimp. You’re more than aware that your martial arts skills consist of twirling the chopsticks when you eat sushi. And best of all? The “man” you’ve been raising is already making a bee-line for the other room. Yep, you’re on your own here, Mom.

Sleep in my eyes, I reach for the phone – ready to call the fine men in blue (whom, for some reason, I STILL believe in). That’s when the flashlight shines directly into the glass panel on the front door. I freeze. Squinting from around the corner and fumbling for the 9 button on my phone, I see the glint of a badge. I look closer. Yep, it’s a police officer. Wow! Maybe I shouldn’t have been so hard on Bacon Breath after all (cursing his name to everyone in town who’d listen). Maybe they saw a burglar, rapist, murderer shining flashlights into unsuspecting women’s homes and is here to rescue us. WAKE UP, MOM! You’re not thinking straight!

Of course, it’s the darn cop who’s doing the shining in the first place! Duh! I stumble toward the door. “Yes, officer, can I help you?” He verifies my name and tells me it is imperative I call the Keene Police Department this very moment. I’m horrified. “Why? What’s this about? Did something happen? Is everything ok?” He responds that he knows nothing (shocker) except that I need to call them immediately. He gives me their non emergency number.

Pork Chop answers the phone. I tell him who I am, entirely not placing the name with our recent run in on Main Street (after all, I’ve already filled out the back of the ticket – marked it not guilty – and have sent it out for a court date). Pork Chop tells me that he made an error on the ticket he sent me. Instead of a $72 fine, it’s a $74 fine.

WELL, THANK YOU OFFICER! Thank you for scaring the shit out of me. Thank you for protecting our streets from druggies. Thank you for disrupting my home in the middle of the night and waking my children and pets. And, most of all, THANK YOU for telling me I have to pay another $2 for something that wasn’t even my fault in the first place! Justice has been served! You must feel fucking proud!

I virtually hang up with him.

Three days later, I receive a new (corrected) ticket in the mail. But Bacon Bits is so sloppy that he forgets to make a copy of both sides of this new ticket, making it impossible for me to even have the option of entering a not guilty plea. I throw it in a file (the one I will take to court with me) and curse his name for the remainder of the week.

This is a man who has NOTHING better to do than harass ordinary, law abiding people. This is  a man who ENJOYS torturing people. This is a man who doesn’t get laid. Or, if he does, he HAS to be on top.

I am excited about my April court date. I am anxious to tell the judge about Bacon Bit’s fine attention to detail and his uncanny ability to make quotas at any cost. While the City of Keene is stoned, no one there need fear the wild U Turn avoiding good citizens headed to the pawn shop for quick cash.

I made $12 at the thrift shop that day. In the end, I’ll probably lose more than $60. But you can bet your bippy that we’ll be eating Pork Roast that night in April, win or lose, in tribute to the hard work and fine service of officer Goodwin!

If you’re ever on Main Street in Keene and you see a woman standing in front of a U Turn sigh with a poster reading “Honk for Hogs!” and smoking a crack pipe with an unregistered gun tied to her hip and threatening passersby for no apparent reason (hey, laws don’t apply in Keene unless they are traffic laws!) be sure to say hello! But whatever you do, don’t make a U Turn!

Hear me Roar!

My Lesbian Women’s Studies Teacher

After talking to a bisexual friend of mine who is considering leaving her husband for a woman today, I was brought back to the face and messages of a woman I met years ago. This woman was my instructor. She taught me about what it meant to be a woman, verses a girl in a way my own mother never had. And she did it without either of us realizing it.

I took my first Women’s Studies course the summer of my junior year of college. The course was held in an old mill building in Manchester, NH and part of the University of New Hampshire summer curriculum. An overachiever, I was hoping to earn enough credits over the summer to help me to graduate with a bachelor’s degree in three years. While most of my friends were on the five and six year plans, I had one mission at hand: to grow up, and to do it fast!

I spent most of my childhood wanting to be anything but a child. As an oldest and a type A personality, I was always more comfortable around adults than I was my peers. Maybe that has something to do with why I was picked last in gym class. Or, that could just be my amazing ability to trip over lint in the most sterile of environments. Either way, as I entered that Women’s Studies class, the last thing I stopped to consider myself as, was, indeed, a woman.

Last to arrive, I slid into the front row of a tiny make-shift classroom. A woman, stocky, with spiky hair and a perma-smirk on her lips, nodded hello as I mumbled a feeble apology for my tardiness. I assumed this woman was the professor and I was correct. She gave us a syllabus of the course. Scanning it for dreaded tests and hoping for endless essays, I quickly noticed the lack of either of them on the paperwork. I flipped it over. Nothing. Instead, I later learned, the class would basically consist of a series of readings, discussions, and class presentations. I wrinkled my nose.

The woman in front of me, whose name I cannot remember, but whose face and body I will never forget, was vibrantly waving her arms around as she talked in giddy excitement about our long-ago suffragette sisters. I remember feeling badly for the only male in our classroom – a slight boy who looked anything but comfortable and pushed his weedy bangs out of his eyes about every thirty seconds. I was intrigued by this woman’s gentle confidence and matter-of-fact “this is who I am” style.

My professor never made any attempts to hide her sexuality from the class. Yes, if you haven’t guessed it, I am, indeed, a lesbian. I sat, wide-eyed, and more interested in listening to what she had to say than I’d been before this not-so-surprising revelation.

I’m not sure what I really learned in her class of an academic nature. It was, after all, more than 12 years ago. But what I did take from her class was a few very confident, very simple statements.

Once, when we were talking about body image and the American media, she commented about a woman’s “real” weight. This weight was, what she referred to as the “correct” weight that any person’s body naturally wants to sit at. At 5’9 and 150 lbs at the time, I was more than impressed when she blatantly stated, “I weight 160. That’s just what I weigh. I can gain weight or lose it, but 160 is what I feel comfortable at. I know 160 is where I’m supposed to be – my real weight.”

I’m not sure it was her announcing her actual weight to the class or the confidence she had behind her announcement that impressed me more. This woman was a cut-to-the-chase kind of gal and I was more than certain she pulled no punches.

Another message she tried to get across to all of us “straight” (or at least pretending to be) girls in the class, was that it was okay to be who we were – to stand behind our ideals and to be strong. Strong woman, she reminded us, are always the ones who make history.

I took this message home to my family’s Thanksgiving dinner that year and was virtually laughed out of the kitchen by my three brothers and father. Even my mother rolled her eyes, as though I’d been brainwashed by some lesbian extremist. I was angry enough to spit. And, I was angry enough to change my political science minor to Women’s Studies.

Since taking that class, I’ve found I have an affinity for my sisters – both in present day life and of the past. I admire women who’ve been strong enough to stand up for what they believe in, brave enough to come out, and never afraid to say “this is who I am, take it or leave it!” I take special note of these women when I meet them and always stop to take the time to compliment their courage.

Her class also taught me to do something else I’d never done before: To pay more respect to my female elders. In my work, I often run into elderly women with great stories to tell of their pasts. Whether Republican homemakers or left-ring radicalists and political shakers, I never walk away from a woman who has a story to tell. I am now of the belief that women – all of us – have a shared experience and platform on which to speak that unites us. We are, after all, women. Hear us roar!

I left that summer school class yearning for more. No longer was I put off by class presentations and open discussions about things like sexuality and sexism – topics I’d once steered away from because they seemed too politically charged. Instead, I craved these debates and the kind of open dialogues that helped me to find myself and what shapes my belief systems: Yes, I grew up in a conservative home with conservative family values, but those values don’t have to define me, I learned. I do, indeed, believe in gay marriage and that everyone has a right to love whomever they chose.

I walked into her class a girl. I met a lesbian who was passionate about her sisters. This woman embraced me as though we’d been family all along. I don’t even remember her name. But, it is because of her, that I left the class not only as a woman, but loving them in a whole new way too!

the Morning After

I most definitely am heading for a mid-life crisis, I tell myself, as I hit the computer first thing this morning, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes and wondering if other people call 10 a.m. morning. Thankful the kids are at school, I head straight for my nearly empty pack of Marlboro mediums. Is it normal to sit, fresh from a cozy slumber, in front of an open window when it’s 20 degrees out, just to get a “hit?” Next, I’ll be slamming 20 mgs of Wellbutrin and Xanax down my throat. Dam. If only I’d been able to take a liking to coffee!

Is this what life’s supposed to be like by age 35? I know I’ve always been a bit immature. I still parole the kid toy aisles for a sneak peek at the latest Brat doll. Raised by Catholics with very strict rules, things like fashion and even Madonna were completely out. And with no daughters in sight to push my childhood lusts upon, I’ve resorted to keeping my fashion fetish in the closet – sort of.

Sitting in an oversized sky blue bathrobe with my hair sticking out at every angle, it’s funny to think I know a thing about fashion! And in reality, my fashion sense is limited to what the local thrift “boutiques” in Southern New Hampshire have to offer me. Jennifer Lancaster would puke! (The former Jennifer Lancaster anyway).

One cigarette left. I debate chain-smoking it into oblivion and remember I’ve promised myself to quit. I’ve also promised myself to lose 20 lbs by the new year. I think I’ve gained five. Where did I put my lighter?

Does it make me a bad mother to love these moments where the house is cleaned out and the only noises and distractions come from the family pets? Does it make me even worse to wonder if there’s a local doggy daycare and cat kennel they could spend their 8 to 3′s at?

Went to bed at about 2:30 last night. Sleep’s becoming more and more of a commodity these days.

I know I should be getting to work. I’ve already started the tub. I call mornings like this “slow wake up days.” My boys roll their eyes at days like this. They resent it taking me so long to get up and get my day rolling. But I’ve never been a morning person. In college, I quickly learned never to schedule a class earlier than 10 a.m. Most writers (and artists for that matter) that I’ve met are that way.

Rolling around post the alarm clock snooze mating game this morning, I decided on several people I’ll write about in the upcoming week or so. When I came up with the Time Out! people project concept, I was worried that I’d have enough people to write about. 365 is an intimidating number. But then I realized these people don’t all have to be living, they don’t all have to be people I’ve known personally, and they definitely don’t all have to be “real.” Some can (and will) be character’s, authors, even cartoons. I can even write about the “personalities” I’ve named within myself – Lola and Sylvia. (I am not a schizophrenic, nor do I have multiple personality disorder). Lola and Sylvia are simply names I’ve given to the different sides of myself – or moods.

Lola, for example, is my sexual beast. She’s the one who went behind the big fat tree with Jason and Darren (see earlier blog). I’m quite positive that Lola’s a sex addict with a hunger for sexual attention that extends well beyond normal. I named her after taking a My Space sex quiz where they gave you your “stripper name” at the end. Mine was Lola Heavenkiss. It fit perfectly. And thus, Lola was born.

Sylvia is my wild child. She’s also severely depressed. It’s Sylvia who writes, has an attraction to anything gothic, is an avid bookworm, and has very little fear. Sylvia is chain-smoking two cigarettes back to back as I write this.

I think I made up Sylvia and Lola as a way of making excuses for some of the behaviors I find myself participating in. Ok. I’m making excuses for myself again. Let me put this another way: I know that I “made my bed” when I decided to get married and have kids. But I don’t define myself as “just mom” or “someone’s wife.” I’m too passionate and wild to subscribe to those labels. So, while society and my family see me as those things, I resent them. Or Sylvia and Lola do. With Sylvia and Lola fully in tact, I am able to tell myself that picture perfect Erin didn’t do it – they did – their free-spirited, overbearing, you-only-live-once strong wills did it.

God, I’m fucking nuts. Maybe I need to switch places with the clients at work today. Seeing it in writing makes it look so insane. Do other suburban housewives come up with alter egos in order to forgive themselves of their sins and temptations? Do other suburban housewives sin at all?

Maybe I need to go out and get some real friends. At least then I’d have real people to blame stuff on! They’d be wild friends – lesbians. Women who bucked society at every chance. Women who dye their hair hot pink at age 40 and wear more rings than I could ever want to hold up on one hand at a time. They would cover their breasts in glitter and run around topless on beaches. They would be proud of their stretch marks and have little time for domestic chores.

I have a writing hang over and I wish I could just write it off. Instead, I need to get moving. If work’s slow today, I’ll keep my eye out for these types. I know I can find them – if anywhere – in a mental health clinic. I’m about to be laid off anyway. Why not get some friends out of the place before I go?

*Jennifer Lancaster wrote “Bitter is the New Black”. This is a great memoir for Gen X’ers who are tired of the corporate life and are ready to slay the dragon.

Eat this! (Why you’ll never catch me eating meatloaf!)

            Mealtime was very important to my family when I was growing up. Mom insisted we eat together as a family every night. She also insisted that we asked to be excused when we finished eating. In order to be excused, we had to finish everything on our plate. Having grown up poor, Mom did not believe in wasting food. This meant eating every last drop of the dreaded meatloaves she’d make once every two weeks.

            I hated Mom’s meatloaf. I don’t mean I disliked it. I mean I actually despised it. When I knew meatloaf was for supper, I instantly planned an attack on the stuff. I knew about 30 ways, by the time I was 16, to ditch a quarter pound of meatloaf without anyone being the wiser. From pocketing it in the bottom of my left cheek until I could escape to the bathroom to throw it up, to sliding it in my sock, bra, pocket, or anywhere else I could think of, I doubt I had more than one actual helping of meatloaf the entire time I lived at my parents house. This is a huge achievement considering my mother knew my hatred for meatloaf and would eye me like prey as she insisted I “stop complaining and eat!”

            I wanted to hit Ron one evening when he simply pushed his meatloaf aside and announced, ‘I can’t eat this. I’m a vegetarian now.” The kid couldn’t have been more than 15 and was announcing this revelation, conveniently enough on ten-lumps-of-stale-bread-a-half-bottle-of-ketchup-thrown-into-a-bloody-pool-of-half-raw-beef-night. I wanted to shake him. My entire face opened, from my chocolate eyes all the way down to my big mouth, when I heard my mother’s response this declaration. “Ok, then, what will you eat?”

            Watching the little shit chomp on a peanut butter sandwich while I sat, stomach growling, contemplating how I was going to ditch the Mommade road kill on my plate, I wanted to choke him. “You can’t be fucking serious!” I expected him to smirk or laugh or wink at me in a “you wish you thought of it first” sort of way. Instead, he simply shrugged, cleared his plate, and replied, “Yep. I’m serious. I just don’t like the taste of meat.”

            Needless to say, Mom didn’t bite on my claims of sudden vegetarianism that night. Instead, she force-fed me the crap, lecturing me on how we should be supportive of Ron’s new lifestyle. I wanted to spit the meatloaf in both of their faces. Instead, I managed to make it to the downstairs toilet. The crazy part of all of it? Ron, twenty years later, is still a vegetarian. And he insists he still does not like the taste of meat. I still think it’s that Mom’s meatloaf was just that bad.

Grandpa: Hear me Roar!

Alrighty, if you read my last blog, then you know a little bit about how I learned about the birds and the bees (or, at the very least, the disproportionate amount of power something as silly as a pair of polka-dotted underwear could have over a man – of any age). Here, something a little different. But still related, in a round about way. Here’s how I became a feminist. Or why I became a feminist, anyway.

About once a month, we’d get a visit from my father’s parents. Grandpa and Mimi had a very unique relationship. He ignored her. And the more he did, the more she persisted with him, anxious for any – even negative – attention from him. Of course, the more she did this, the more he ignored her.

Before they arrived, Mom would brew up a delicious batch of clam chowder or sausage and peppers. Her soup made the house smell like a friendly pub and I took great joy in spicing it up with salt and pepper as I’d walk by to check on her progress. Frantically, we’d clean, the bitter taste of Windex mixing in the stale air, to make sure things were perfect for the visit. Leaving the kitchen floors for last, Mom would always be sure to cut up cheese and pepperoni or make shrimp cocktail for stow-away snacks for their impending tag-team Canasta games.

When Mimi, with her purple nose, would peak her head in the door, I always smiled and was glad to see her. But when Grandpa followed behind, my throat would get dry and something inside of me would grow very quiet and angry. I knew what Grandpa would do before he did it. He’d order me to get him a bowl of soup and poor him a drink.  He would never ask any of my brothers, who may be closer by or not in the middle of something. No, he was insistent, my mother should relax and I, being the only other female hostess in the house, should dedicate the rest of my night to being at his becking call and serving him. I felt like someone should be giving this man a bell and letting me go chew on grass in the backyard while I waited for his next command. I wasn’t so fond of Grandpa.

Fortunately, Dad didn’t inherit all of this sexist thinking and genuinely liked my being his “little girl.” While he often used my mother as a translator to explain hormones or tears out of the blue, he generally tried to take an interest in me and my activities. But when he couldn’t, he found other things we could do together.

One such big project was installing a handmade stone water fountain in the pool area when I was about 12 years old. Being the only one long and skinny enough to scale under the pool to tighten pipes, Dad and I spent days with his strong hands on my ankles as I held my breath and finagled the piping for him. The pride on his face was apparent to a blind person and I was not above squinting to get an even better look. For months, he bragged my brothers about how a girl had done that. How a girl had been the one to fix the plumbing situation in the pool area. I was overjoyed. It was then that I became convinced I could do anything. It was a feeling I took with me into my adulthood. I’ve often wondered if Dad knows how he played a role in developing this part of me – both the negative and positives.

I know Dad is hardly even close to a feminist. He doesn’t have a left-wing bone in his body and certainly does not have room for women who’d be suffrages by the likes of Alice Paul. I, however, admire these woman to the core and have made a concerted effort to fill my heart with their stories and histories. I minored in Women’s Studies at Keene State, enthralled by my first Woman’s Studies professor – a lesbian from the University of New Hampshire summer school program. I vowed to have a daughter one day, a strong daughter, and to teach her to have a mind of her own and to never serve soup on command! Likewise, I promised myself that if I ever had sons, (wonderfully enough, I had TWO) I would not allow them to believe it was okay to treat a woman that way. I have found that the promises I seem to keep throughout my life are the ones I’ve made in reference to the boys. And this is a promise I’ve been able to keep quite easily.