Category Archives: Slice of Life – Two Writing Teachers

You Better Be Glad I Like You

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Yawning before she can open to the first page of Glass Houses, the new book she downloaded the night before, Sabrina gives up and closes her Tab. Already familiar with the author’s mesmerizing writing style, she knows the successive yawns that have overtaken her are hardly portent to the reading material. Sparing the fellow commuter sitting directly across from being able to count her fillings even from that distance should she allow free rein to pandiculation, she presses her lips tightly together stifling yet another yawn. Dear sweet Insomnia, the sonavabitch, in its perverse sense of humor, takes the sleep she was denied in the dead of night when it was needed and uses the rhythmic movements of the subway train to bring it to her in the morning light of her commute to work.

Glancing at the time piece on her wrist as an afterthought, she muses why she even bothers wearing a watch anymore as she checks the time on her cell phone anyway, 06:47am. There is still a solid forty-five minutes or so of her ride to work, barring the expected unexpected delays inherit to morning rush hour. Knowing a losing battle when she feels it, she stores the Tab in her handbag, and like the true City commuter she is, she then zips it and wraps the straps around her wrists for safe keeping before pulling her sunglasses over her eyes and gives in to slumber.

Taking a late breakfast break nearly four hours later, she sits at her desk, her second extra-large coffee of the morning well in hand, curious antici-pation, not letting her wait until the evening commute to begin reading the book. She opens the reader on her PC figuring she can get at least the first chapter in as she takes a bite of the bacon, eggs and cheese on a toasted bialy. The cheese oh so perfectly warm and gooey as she likes it suddenly feeling repulsively mucoid as she reads the opening sentence:

NED POWELL AWOKE FRIDAY morning at eight and rubbed the sleep from his eyes, rolling a viscous, snot-like clump between his fingers like it was putty.

Damn you Andrew Wilmot, you better be glad I like you!

(PS: I finished eating the sandwich anyway.)

Glass Houses by Andrew Wilmot

Verbal Diarrhea Diaries: Look That Up

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I went out to dinner with a few folks the weekend before last. As normal among us as there were ribald shenanigans aplenty. It was all fun and games, a fantastic get together to catch up. Somewhere in the midst of the silliness I noted Crisp (don’t ask/can’t tell), had stopped short for a moment to look at me queerly, but then he continued on with the conversation and I promptly dismissed whatever it was I thought I saw.

We ran into each other on the train this morning. After a moment of general salutations he looks at me saying there’s something he wanted to ask that’s been on his mind since dinner the weekend before. Aha I thought, I did see something, it was not my imagination after all.

“Sure Crisp what’s on your mind” I ask mentally preparing for a serious conversation.

“I know this is stupid,” He starts “but when we were joking around you called me a C.A.D.”

“A C.A.D.?”

“Yeah, usually I can figure out how your convoluted mind jumps and follow your sense of humor, but for the life of me I cannot fathom how you jumped from the archaic to computer-aided design.” He laughs self deprecatingly.

Now, I am mentally scratching my head trying to fathom where we were in the midst of the various topics of conversation that included computer aided design and drew a complete blank.  I am literally thinking to myself who the hell, but Crisp would call it computer-aided design when everyone else who even knows the term calls it by its acro… And that’s when the light bulb lit.

“I called you a cad?” It took everything I had to look in his face and not snort in laughter.

“Yes, a CAD.” He nodded, becoming somewhat perturbed by my barely suppressed mirth.

“By god for a man presumed reasonably adroit, betimes your mind is naught but fandangle. I called you a cad, you dimwit!” I snickered.

The conversation he referred to was a hodgepodge of history that segued into archaic or near archaic words.  I adore Crisp, but at that moment in the conversation clearly his comprehension of archaic  fared not much past the immediate computer age. What was also clear was that he proving the point why such words were near archaic as he still did not get it.  We were nearing his stop and he stood.

“Since you sat for over a week and did not bother ascertain for yourself whether there were possible alternate meanings, especially given the conversation at the time, I shant make it easy and do the work by simply telling you.” I shook my head smiling as he edged towards the door. “Go look that up in your Funk and Wagnalls.“

“My fucking what?” Crisp turned at the door completely confused

A gentleman sitting across from me, who clearly got the reference, started laughing as I put my head down groaned.

It’s been a while since I actually felt my age, thanks Crisp.

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Power in the Blood

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Human Art by Grace Mateo Used tampons on canvas. 20 x 16 inch. www.gracemateo.com

You Don’t Understand (Do You Now?). 2014.
by Grace Mateo
Used tampons on canvas. 20 x 16 inch.
http://www.gracemateo.com

 

The above image will make a lot of you uncomfortable? Why? If you are one of those souls who genuinely get physically sick at the site of blood, I am sorry to have made you feel ill, but I do not  apologize.

I’ll admit that I did the rapidly blinking eye thing as I registered exactly what it was I viewed. After all, I am woman who has made it the half-century mark  in life. To put this in a historical  timeline perspective, I am old enough to remember/have used a menstrual belt, but by the time I was living with my partner in the mid-80’s they were already a thing of the distant past, so I have an itsy bit of personal knowledge in the subject. After all this isn’t anything I haven’t seen virtually every month for the past thirty plus years of it, so big deal. Even as I thought the words, I was already countering thinking, but so many other will think it’s just that, a big deal, and I’m forced to ask myself why? Why is this a big deal?

In the artist’s own words…

This is Human Art. The female body is not something to be afraid of, and it is definitely not disgusting. There are things we don’t speak about, that are traditionally held to be private, but silence only leads to fear and death. So, if you don’t like the things I say or make then you do not have to engage in it. This is not shock art. If you find a woman’s period to be shocking then you, my friend, are most definitely living a sheltered life and need to be better informed about your fellow humans.

I’m not here to further roast the old chestnut of What Is Art?. This is more of a query into this particular human behavior. What is it about the female menstrual cycle that makes people, male and fellow females so uncomfortable?

It takes everything I have to not let my eyes roll in the back of my head whenever I hear a grown woman say “I can’t stand the sight of blood”. The older she is and the more emphatic she is in her repulsion the harder the temptation to do so.  Years ago I was handling a stack of manila folders at work and gave my self a nasty paper cut. One that required my stopping everything to tend to it. As I rinsed my finger at the sink and prepared to bandage it, a co-worker went into mini theatrics about the sight of blood and how I was upsetting her. Trust me when I tell you she was no shrinking violet so that was one time I did roll my eyes in annoyance without hesitation. I asked if she menstruates each month, to which she naturally responded in the positive as I expected. I then queried if she had assistance when removing and disposing of her used feminine hygiene products at that time. Naturally,she naturally responded in the negative, as expected. I concluded with if she can stand processing her bloody bodily functions several times a day, for a few days each damn month, then my manila cut on a finger for a minute was nothing and she needed to shut the fuck up, but I digress and return to my original query.

Why is the female menstrual cycle clouded in this veil of mystery? What is with the menstrual taboo that allows commercials to use the proper terminology for erectile dysfunction and incontinence with almost no filter, but when it comes to female our cycles it’s almost always hidden some form of pseudonym – The Gift, That Time of the Month, the ever classic Aunt Flo and of course the only one that actually makes any sense Period. Basically any and everything that will avoid using the word blood and any iteration of  menses. The only time you hear the word menstrual used regularly is in the phrase “premenstrual syndrome”, but even that is usually shortened to the gentler acronym of PMS. Because we can talk circles about the mental and emotional aspects about menstruation, but the actually physically bloody part of it is always hush-hush. And speaking of bloody – unless advertisers believe every single woman who menstruates also turns into a  Vulcan during her period, what is with the mysterious blue stuff they use to demonstrate Product Y’s absorbancy anyway? Because goodness gracious should they use red food coloring so that it might resemble what it is. I am not even going to touch that nonsense of women wearing white anything below the waist when Mother Nature comes to visit. Trust me when I tell you for a majority of us women, the first few days are not anything near as sanitized as it looks in the above art work, yet only other women and our respective doctors will readily understand this.

Nearly all girls are brought up that they should not talk about menstruation with boys, nor was it appropriate to discuss menstruation with their fathers. Most of the single fathers I know learned that their daughters were not quite so little girls anymore via a female friend or relative because of this. Young heterosexual women are almost always embarrassed the first time they misjudge their monthly supply amount and have to ask their significant others to run to the store for their feminine hygiene product/s of choice.  Tip for any men reading this: Please, please pay attention to what brand your woman uses/tells you to get. You do not want to get into that argument – really you just don’t.

Historically, a menstruating woman was considered sacred and powerful. Yet like so many things and stories that extolled the feminine power, it was wrapped up in mythology and dismissed or outright just dismissed, especially in the patriarchy of many religions that view a menstruating woman as “unclean”. The menstrual taboo is more prevalent in most movies and television shows when a woman’s menses is generally mentioned in relation to the thankfulness of unwanted or regret for lack of  pregnancy. Otherwise periods are generally portrayed as something traumatic, embarrassing, offensive, gross and/or for cheap comedic premenstrual syndrome (PMS) makes us evil laughs.  Outside of the rare portrayals of menarche, when a girl experiences her first period, there are very few portrayals of the completely natural act of female nature that it is.

Granted, things are slowly getting better. There are a hilarious couple of commercials by Always, with the “The Gift before The Gift” tagline.  New Moon Party and The Camp Gyno. The HelloFlo campaign takes wonderful pock shots at their behaviors when it comes to menarche. In these commercials not only are the products free of the packaging, all allusions to blood are not done in blue! Parents of prepubescent girls, if you have not already seen these commercials you should. I wish these care packages were around when my mother was explaining it to me. Designed for young girls, the commercial and the ensuing products are made to help demystify the period for those near the onset of puberty. Take the secrecy out of such items from the beginning, it does not turn into such a taboo later.

I am not saying a detailed analysis of whether Kotex is better than Always is discussion to be had at the family dinner.   If your family is that progressive that you can, I saw “Bravo!”, more power to you. Women can talk about the various stages of their pregnancies good and bad without a problem. Parents can show videos of the up close and personal views of the birth of their children without batting an eye. Some will watch such videos voluntarily on PBS type stations in all its bloody glory and it’s just fine. Yet let a woman place a package of feminine hygiene products on the conveyor belt where a young boy is packing, or at the top of her bag where a grown man has to inspect it and watch what happens. The mere thought of a woman’s menstrual cycle is so disturbing to some, that most males will give pause before touching the item and the younger the male, the more likely the revulsion.

Because it is still the presumed norm that menstruation should remain hidden.  And while whether or not  the above image is art is debatable, the subject matter depicted as a discussion point should not be.

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Almost A Moment – Always A Memory

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One afternoon in the late eighties, my late-husband and I were in some random deli in midtown. A gentleman with a full bushy beard, an overcoat, a ushanka pulled low on his bowed head, though it was hardly the weather for it, sat at an adjacent table and begin eating a sandwich. l paid little attention to him other than to casually note he was hirsute. Tufts of dark hair peeking out from the cuffs and the top of the t-shirt spied under the open collar of his shirt.  Something about the guy nagged the back of my mind, but I didn’t want to outright stare while I attempted to figure it out.  Still, I would steal surreptitious glances, trying to confirm or deny my hunch. In the midst of eating, what it was about the guy finally hit me so I pulled out my inner three-year old and in a childish voice said “Fuck it!”

Bill immediately snorted as that had become something of a silly catchphrase for us at the time. The gentleman at the other table startled, but did not otherwise acknowledge my low-keyed outburst. Satisfied I had the right of it I continued dining and conversing with my husband. As Bill went to pay for the meal,  I started stacking the dishes on our table.  I glanced at the guy one more time and simply couldn’t resist.

“Fuck it! Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!”

This time he looked up and slowly smiled. It was a rueful kind of “Ah, you got me!” smile.  Having fully satisfied my idle curiosity, I simply winked, nodded once in acknowledgement and continued cleaning off the table as though nothing happened. Bill arrived back to the table just as the guy was lowering his head back down to his meal. I knew Bill recognized him when his eyes started to go wide.

“Is that…?”

I grabbed Bill by the arm and pulled him away before he could think to disturb the man any more than I already had.

“And being a fool, he was simple-minded, he didn’t see a king. He only saw a man alone and in pain.” –The Fisher King

When later asked why I pulled him away,  I responded the man just wanted to be left alone, get a bite to eat and be on his way. If he wanted fawning star treatment he wouldn’t be at some random deli in midtown. Who were we to disturb him? I was afraid if we spoke to him we would draw attention to him. If my interpretation of that rueful little smile was correct, it was clearly not something he wanted at that moment.

That man?  Robin Williams.

This was within a couple of years or so of Williams’ tears of laughter inducing one man show Robin Williams Live At  The Met. At the height of his career, the top of his game.

I sit here now, the last person left of that random happenstance, that snapshot in time. Had you told me then, that he would be gone less than thirty years later, I would not have believed it. If you had asked me five minutes before I read of his passing yesterday, I would not have believed it. He has been gone roughly twenty-four hours now and I still cannot believe it.

Facebook - Robin Williams I, and I imagine most of the comedy loving world, spent a good chunk of time last night watching YouTube after YouTube of Williams in bittersweet heartache. Not that any age is ever the right age for someone to leave us, but in Robin’s case, it really was far too soon.

“We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.”
– Dead Poets Society

I mean no disrespect here for those that suffer the level of depression that had plagued him, but for me, at this moment, the hows and whys of his death does not change the simple fact that he is gone. Williams has been a part of the comedic world and our lives since the 1970s.  I figured if anyone, anyone would go for the George Burn’s Oldest Living Wise-Acre record it would have been Robin Williams. I could easily imagine him still part self-deprecating and part wily and part sage and still hilarious with a scoundrel’s twinkle in those youthful blue eyes that would belie his much advanced years.  Alas, that is not to be.

“Shazbot!”
– Mork and Mindy

Last night the skies were clear. Logically I know many across the globe woke up to clear bright skies this morning, but I woke up to a gray morning, darkening clouds threatening rain. The skies matching the mood of many here in NYC already missing him. The world is a just a little bit darker without him in it, it is fitting. And that he would pass during the brightest nights of the Perseid Meteor Showers, the night skies welcome another star making it just a little bit brighter for a little while. I find it equally fitting.

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Slice of Life - Two Writing Teachers

Slice of Life Writing Challenge | Two Writing Teachers

No Apologies

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So Linda Kelsey posted an article on the Daily Mail, a UK publication. In the article the self-proclaimed “unapologetic fattist”

Oh Linda Kelsey honey, let me begin with these wonderful words from the incomparable Mary J. Bligh:

So I like what I see, when I’m looking at me,
When I’m walking past the mirror

And yes it’s a full length mirror, showing all of me from my cankles, through my “bulging bellies and billowing pillows of back and shoulder stuffing, punctured by flabby arms and lardy legs” to my massive mess of curly hair. And I adore every ounce of it!

I am not going to go through the various fallacies in your pseudo medical proclamations solely equating fat with a litany of potentially fate medical conditions. We’ve all been on that not-so-merry-go-round and rather leave that to those who are better versed in that debate handle it. My focus is on your inability to understand how women of a certain size can dare to be happy. I do not know about you, but the source of my happiness is not attached to the size of my waistline.

You don’t like fat on yourself, that’s fine. You don’t like fat on other people, that’s equally fine. You are entitled to your opinion on both counts. However, your issues with the fat body are not mine. And certainly are not the Happiness Police. My happiness is not reliant upon your opinion -there’s that word again- of my fatness. My happiness cannot be validated or unvalidated by anyone but the crazy woman I face in that full length mirror each day.

I suppose a part of me is somewhat grateful that unapologetic fattists such as yourself at least recognize that not all of us fat chicks are miserable beings, hiding ourselves from the world, crying into a (insert fatty foods of choice here – I don’t want mention specifics and accidentally trigger anyone). After all we fatties are clearly so sensitive with no self control that even mentioning food could set us off on a feeding frenzy <– that was SARCASM in case you missed it. I am not grateful that you and your fellow unapologetic fattists feel that we should be just that though, hiding behind our own for walls until we shrink down to a size the lot of you deem no longer a blight and acceptable for public viewing.

Not gonna happen chica. You want to call me a fat girl, oh please do because guess what? I am fat and that’s that.

Slice of Life - Two Writing Teachers
Slice of Life Challenge: Two Writing Teachers

What’s In A Word…

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What’s in a word? Sometimes too much and yet not enough.

A friend and I, who had not seen each other in a long while, were on our way to dinner when I ran into an erstwhile colleague. As we exchanged greetings, I introduced them to each other as such, friend and erstwhile colleague. When we parted ways, my friend asks why I was so specific in my introductions. As a response I asked her the names of my children, their ages and my birthday. Basically things most of my casual friends would know, but not necessarily a colleague or an acquaintance, especially a former one. The colleague would not have known such information about me when we worked together; he and I were never friends. I’m not even speaking on good friends or best friends here, just friends. You know the people who have not risen to such importance in your life that you would invite them to join in on your vacation, but you would be happy to have them over for a back yard barbecue. I have colleagues I consider friends and would them invite to barbecue. There are other colleagues that I will hang out with socially for the occasional happy hour after work get together, but would not invite to my house. Then there are the ones, like the one above, where my only interactions with them are on the job.

We have become this society so afraid of hurting another’s feelings, that we oftentimes will give elevated credence to people to avoid potentially embarrassing or insulting them. The advent of Facebook has truly downplayed the definition of a friend. It is even sneaky in that you can set certain people to be an acquaintance without them knowing it. Yes, technically it is so you can post things to your status that your only friends can see, but they themselves would never know that you only consider them an acquaintance, not a friend. We  differentiate friend from good friend and best friend. One really has to earn their stripes for those titles, but dumping everyone one else into this generic friend folder does not work for me. Just because you are not a complete stranger to me does not automatically make you a friend, let alone my friend.

So what’s the big deal? How much does it really hurt anything to call someone a friend who is not? What’s the harm? For many – there is no big deal. It will not hurt a thing. When someone I consider a friend introduces another to me as a friend, I immediately presume that this new person is at the very least of some minor importance to the one doing the introductions. I may be more open to that person, give a certain level of respect to them based on that information. After all, based on the mutual person between us, a friend of yours is a potential friend of mine. However, if a friend introduces someone to me as a co-worker or colleague I am immediately friendly, but guarded. Until indicated otherwise, s/he is not necessarily a person to start sharing embarrassing remember the time? stories with. For me to casually introduce him as a friend a) elevates him to a status he has not earned in my life and b) undermines the importance of those in my life I truly consider friends. And to me that is harmful.

In the midst of a conversation regarding people who carelessly or blatantly misspell a person’s name someone exclaimed to me “Oh, don’t you just hate that?” Without really thinking about it I said that I did not hate it. So yes, I with the unique, some would say weirdly, spelled moniker was looked at with obvious surprise. And be honest, we are all guilty of casually throwing out the hate and love words for really trivial things from time to time. I explained there is a reason people complain that words like love and hate and friend has lost the power of their meaning. Collectively they have become so over used for such meaningless things as to be near meaningless themselves. Hate is all-consuming. Hate drives your day-to-day existence, becomes your most prevalent thoughts in all things. You channel so much of your energy into that which you hate, nearly all else takes a backseat to it. The barista at Starbucks who wrote Raven on my cup when I clearly spelled out R-A-I-V-E-N-N-E was worthy of my pissed-off tongue lashing when I saw it. Once I said what I had to say, I walked out the door not giving it or him a second thought. Because annoying as it was — why bother having me spell it if he was going to do whatever he wanted any way?– it was hardly worthy of my expending such energy required as to hate him. I’ll save that for the racists, sexists etc. out there who deign to wreak havoc on people’s lives for no other reason than their own stupidity and yes hatred. See? There is an enormous difference between “Oh, don’t you just hate fat people?” And “Oh, don’t you just hate when people misspell your name?”

Conversely…

“I love crossword puzzles.”
“I love those shoes.”
“I love sports.”
“I love my best friend.”
“I love my spouse/significant other.”
“I love *insert deity of choice here*.”

Yeah, I am not even going go any further on the far too many ways in which we abuse the word love. That one word encompasses so much, to make it feel so belittled sometimes.  After all, how I feel about Doughnut Plant’s coconut creme filled square doughnuts, while pure, deep  and true, is hardly comparable to that of how I felt about my late-husband. Yet,  many others would use the word love to convey both feelings – that’s how little credence  we’re now giving to the word.  Other languages, especially Asian languages get it right in having specific words/phrases for different types of love to solve the this.  I think the English language fails us greatly here to have one such word encompass so many things. And as a poet it is a major frustration on just how limited it is to rhyme!

It is true – any word we use only has the power we give it and conversely the power we take away by the over use of it. Certain curse words/phrases hold their power because we are told we not supposed to use them. The power of those words has carried on through the centuries at least until recent modern times. They are used so cavalierly these days, the shock value of them is slowly wearing off. Hopefully not in our lifetime, but soon enough, the washing of a child’s mouth out with soap for such an offense will be a dying antiquated notion.

There is a reason we have all these different terms for people and things in our lives. The people we have as friends, share our love with, even give our hate to should never roll off trivially from our lips, yet they do because the words themselves, that should be held with reverence and spoken with care, are becoming trivial. We should learn to use at least those three words friend, love and hate,  for their specialness as intended and use them properly.

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The Blues Singer

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.
.
First look up and down she seems cool
Someone urban, yet proud with a touch of sass
She chooses a sofa over a stool
For the main support of her ample mass
Some truths settle in so cruel
You just know she is no vapid, hoity-toity lass

Her maquillage is a multihued blend
Colors not in vogue for a human face to adorn
Velvet yards seemingly without end
Feather a figure where it really shouldn’t be worn
A seam or two will soon need a mend
But what will mend her expression so forlorn?

There’s a distant pain in her eyes
That feels like no amount of warmth can overcome
Merged with an air of deep despise
Red talons sift between rest and a hard tapping drum
On the table top as smooth her most painful lies
Yeah, you recognize that kind of hurt and then some

Was this hurt from just yesterday
Or precious moments trampled in her distant past
Was she plotting on viable ways to pay
Or wondering if ever again she’ll laugh last
Then somewhere a piano starts to play
A chord that hurdles through her sorrows vast

You watch her venture to the stage
As she take the mike her rouged lips starts to quiver
The notes cradle her gritty voice of rage
In a vernacular that causes the soul’s core to shiver
It takes berth as both fresh and sage
Through heartbreaks where she was never the giver

Her look now seems less like a sin
In the glaring spotlight it’s subtle not cheap or crass
Still sipping inspiration through her gin
Reminding you of all the pain you’re trying to pass
Still you think, as you feel it all within
She’s the saddest girl to ever hold a martini glass

She takes you ‘to the river’ in tears owned
Her voice filling the virtual vacuum of her surrounds
As she layers Janis on Billy in tone
Her notes vary rising high only to vale to the ground
You wonder is it the song or a true moan
Notes you’ll hear days later when there’s no one around

She sings a provocative mix
Watching the audience eat out the palm of her hand
For you know it’s how she gets her kicks
By taking you on this tearful journey she’s planned
But for now you sit totally transfixed
Leaving only when the pain is more than you can stand

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I was at a jazz club in Harlem with a heartbroken friend. Usually there is upbeat jazz, fusion bands, the perfect thing to help start the healing, but that night. That night the Fates decided clearly more wallowing was needed.  It was not the night for the melancholy to be there. The above is a poetic rendition of how one singer broke nearly everyone there down. I had started this poem that night while we were still there. The above is the end result.

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Not The Same As…

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Someone recently wrote:

Saying “I don’t date fat people” is the thing same as saying “I don’t date black people”.

No. No. No. And just no.

First let me state the following is how it looks from MY experiences, others may be similar, but mileage will vary. Every person has a right to date, or not date, within her/his own racial preferences. This is not about that. This is about the apple/oranges comparing/pitting one set of struggles against another. This is about how as a fat woman of color deep in the midst of both struggles, being able to say how and why they are not the same and how it affects me.

For most of history, if you dated/married fat, it was mostly just a descriptive. Yes, being fat has always had its own stereotypes, but until semi-recent times these were based more on the physical aspects of being fat, than on the intellectual or psychological state of the fat person. A simpleminded person was deemed so because of his or her behavior, regardless of size. Nowadays some will determine a person’s intelligence, or presumed lack thereof, solely based on the person being corpulent. It is as insidious as incorrect as the presumption that all overweight people are unhealthy based solely on their appearance. And all of this is regardless of race.

So let’s not ignore the elephant in the room from where a lot of this black/white nonsense springs. Regardless of corpulence, historically here in America, it was not droves of fat white people shipped over to pick cotton, tobacco etc. With our history, white dating color, but black in particular has always been fraught with issues. Some of these issues still persist, on both sides, to this day.

A few years ago, a white guy expressed his understanding of why blacks would want to date/marry white because it is “stepping up”. Conversely implying that we [blacks]-were somehow *lesser than* and should be grateful. He was not grateful for my response.

  • Is saying “I don’t date fat people” the thing same as saying “I don’t date blondes”? No, because a fat person can become blonde.
  • Is saying “I don’t date fat people” the thing same as saying “I don’t date people who wear glasses”? No, because a fat person can get contacts.
  • Is saying “I don’t date fat people” the thing same as saying “I don’t date (insert religion) or people with piercings”? No, because again these are things that can be (granted, not easily) changed, should a person so choose to make that change.

Let’s try saying “I’ll drink Cherry Kool Aid” but “I won’t drink water”. One maybe be somewhat malleable to change, the other is not. As a fat black woman I can, to a certain extent, change my flavor (my weight, my hair color, my hair, and as a person of a certain level of melanin, to some degree my complexion – my l Kool-Aid if you will). However, whether I am a glass or a pitcher, none of that changes the fact that no matter what flavors I choose, at the core I am still Black (water).

When I read someone does not want to date black people, it is a dismissal not just of the outer layer of our physical being; it also dismisses the core of who we are as a culture and as individuals. I don’t mean just the blacks the follow the Hip-Hop/Urban/R&B culture. I know blacks born and raised here in New York City who would recognize the music of Luka Šulić and Stjepan Hauser of the “Two Cellos”, but if shown pictures would have to guess the difference between T-Pain and Li’l Wayne. Neither of which would matter; to those who would not date them, simply because they are black and therefore will be immediately dismissed. Regardless of where we as blacks are on the socio/ economic/class line, it diminishes our individual experiences, our hearts, our souls, our humanity on top of what makes us black, what makes us – us.

So yes saying “I don’t date fat people” is the thing same as saying “I don’t date black people” is flippant, dismissive and frankly out right insulting.

“I may date a different race or color, it doesn’t mean I don’t like my strong black brother”
“Before you can read me, you have to learn how to see me”
/En Vogue – Free Your Mind

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Tuesday Slice of Life Challenge – Two Writing Teachers

To Be Or Not To Be Guilty…

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In the past few weeks, there seems to have been a spike of discussion online and in real life of females who have Friends With Benefits (FWBs) versus “a real” relationship and whether or not it is settling. I find this uniquely interesting as it is mostly the females who felt a sense of “less-than” or guilt for their choices. Most males do not feel any lessening of their self-worth for having FWBs, let alone guilt. So why are so many females so hung up over it. For simplicity I am going to mostly stick with the cisgender heterosexual monogamous relationships as I write, honestly because it’s easier, but the  subject crosses genders, sexualities and poly/mono -gamies.

Just as I had to work out my own issues, everyone must decide their sexual comfort levels that for themselves. I am not providing a How To on getting around/past/over said guilt. This is simply my two cents on why so many women seem to have this guilt in the first place. Your mileage will definitely vary.

I think a lot of the “guilt” some women put on themselves about sex outside of a relationship and/or marriage is rooted in the things taught to us growing up. Whether covertly or overtly a lot of it comes down do modern society’s taint that sex should be about love. In short, women should only be having sex with the person in which she shares mutual love. And if the mutual love is there then they should be married. Blame the “happily ever after” Prince Charming fed to little girls through Disney princess animations and every romantic comedy where gal gets the guy tropes as adults. Unfortunately, these far from realistic ideals of love and romance become so ingrained in our psyches, that come adulthood if it’s not Fourth of July fireworks, swelling arias, heart beat skipping breathlessness 24/7 it’s then it is somehow “less than” and is therefore settling.

Every female that reaches adulthood has heard “If you’re good enough to have sex with you then you’re good enough to marry”. While more experienced females, married or not, tend to have less of a bias on the subject, it is still very hard for most young females to work through the duality of wanting to satisfy a basic need versus “what would Mama think?” It is a grace to the modern times that couples who live together have far less of a stigma now than as few as fifty years ago. That we are now in the 21st Century has very little bearing on these core beliefs handed down to us through the ages since Adam and Eve.  And speaking of the First Couple… Compound all of the above with the thought of many religions which equate, and condemn, sex outside of the marital bed as being a sin.

The magic of the marital bed, in and of itself is funny as it does not 100% absconds one from the guilt of sex. I know many women that have been married or in long term relationships for years, but still will not have sex in their parent’s home when going for an extended family visit. I can pretty much guarantee that 90% of the time it is the female who has the hang-up about it. And 90% of that 90% is due to the fear of what their dear moms would think. These are from women who clearly did not arrive upon this earth via immaculate conception, yet the very thought of their mothers even thinking that they themselves are doing the very thing that gave them life, though they have every legal and “moral” right to as a married person, still makes them uncomfortable.

And while according to the adage the numbers of “size” doesn’t matter, oh but the number of partners a female has seem to do. Even a woman who is a serial monogamist has this magic intangible number that suddenly transforms her from  someone continually looking, but failing to find love, to becoming something…else.  A woman with one FWB is merely is not even pretending that what she is doing is about finding love and at best is “settling”, at worst she too becomes the ambiguous “something…else”. However, females happily engaging in multiple FWBs may then have wonderful pseudonyms from trollop to whore attached to their deeds as the classic double standards of the Madonna/Whore syndrome rears its nasty little head. Because oddly enough, even after all this time, since Eve said “Yes” oh so long ago, the onus to say “No”, to resist temptation – especially sexual temptation, is almost always on the female. Thus, those of us who can’t or simply won’t resist are in the wrong.

After all, we all know boys will be boys, but  good girls don’t.

When society in general has managed to create this dichotomy that glorifies and vilifies sex, even for those who have “the rights” to do it, really, is it any wonder so many women have guilt?

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That’s my two cents for today – come see how others are slicing:

Slice of Life - Two Writing Teachers

Tuesday Slice of Life Writing Challenge – Two Writing Teachers

 

No Arguments Here

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This morning I’m standing in line at one of my usual breakfast places. That there is a long line, long by my standards as a regular, tells me someone came in with a large order that is slowing down the usually quick and efficient process of the line cooks. It happens sometimes, you deal with it or you walk away. I was contemplating between the two options when one of the line cooks spies me at the back of the line and smiles. He holds up one finger, then two fingers, his head cocked to the side in an unspoken query. I smile back, wave and then nod, holding up one finger. In this particular restaurant they have two things I like to order for breakfast. Isidori, the second line cook, is silently asking if I want my breakfast sandwich (#1) or my omelette platter (#2). Thus, I just as silently respond yes, I would like the sandwich. He smiles and indicates with his head to go ahead to the cashier.

Ah, the sweet perks of being an engaging regular! I am spoiled sometimes.

I blow a kiss to him in gratitude and go to pay for my meal. I stand adjacent to a woman who is ticking off the various items ordered to Cristina, the cashier, making sure they have everything. Now I know who had the big order. Cristina asks about the size of a coffee ordered and the woman calls out to someone on different line.

“Margie! What size you want your hazelnut coffee again?”

Now, saying she was loud, really does not do it justice. Seriously, I felt my ears pop as though I were in a rapidly moving elevator. At least six different people in my line of vision reacted to the decibel level of her voice by turning their collective heads either towards or away from her and vocalizing some form of exclamation and/or expletive, including my leaning away from her with “Well damn!”

As the nearest person to her, I received the venom of her stare.

“Please! I weren’t that loud.”

I mentally bit my lip resisting the urge to inform her folks on the other side of the International Date Line, where it is the middle of the night, are likely waking up wondering why they are thinking about hazelnut coffee. Luckily, she was spared my snark when her friend came over and settled it.

“Yeah, you were. What the hell wrong with you screaming like that?”

She glances around at various raised eyebrow/“you crazy”/WTF reactions to her. You can all, but hear the “Whatever!” going through her mind.

“Raivenne, here’s your breakfast honey.” Isidori and Cristina in their usual efficiency already have my food cooked, coffee poured and items bagged.

“Thanks Cristina, here you go.” In my usual efficiency have my credit and restaurant discount card at the ready as I walk around the two women and pay for my breakfast.

“Have a nice day,” Cristina hands me my cards and my bagged order. “See you tomorrow?”

“Thanks, maybe. Enjoy your day.” I take my items and start turning to leave.

“Wait, I was in front of her, how she go first?” Ms. Decibel wants to know. At least her voice has returned to a volume more acceptable for human conversation.

Cristina looks at her in confusion, clearly not understanding her question.

“Because she’s Raivenne…” she states as though it should be obvious.

I smirk and walk away, who am I to argue with such infallible logic?

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It’s Tuesday – come see how others are slicing it up today at Two Writing Teachers:

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Slice of Life Story Challenge – Two Writing Teachers