Wednesday, November 29, 2017

Another Moment Longer

During my shuttle ride home from the airport, the driver, a focused yet jovial man, handed three pieces of fruit to the valet concierge at the Bonaventure.

An orange, mango and lime were my best guesses in the darkness, going by shape; the driver took care of his suitcase duties, wished the passenger a good trip, and then glided fast around to the front of his blue van, so fast I didn't even make him turning the van's corner, picking fruit from the front passenger seat and handing three pieces to the concierge one at a time, the concierge turning one then another and the other over in his hands.

The concierge received the driver warmly, the two commenting on the produce, immune to the departing passenger who, still gathering himself on the sidewalk, complained of the same cliche banalities people often complain of on cue upon arriving in the City of Angels (or even in the conversational vicinity).

The driver and concierge waved goodbye to him, making no rebuttal, then looked at the three pieces of fruit again, now in the concierge's hands, laughing in the darkness another moment longer.

Monday, November 20, 2017

Talk About a Wellness Woman Exam, Huh?

In this week's weird health insurance encounter, aka 1-800-WTF, a rep urged me to ask my regular doctor to also do my complete eye exam, as if she's just going to roll out this hidden eye exam equipment, or fit me for the lenses I just mentioned I need, or adjust my glasses I just told you I need adjusted.

Meanwhile, my doctor is also my gynecologist, so could you even imagine; I'm there in the stirrups and hark! a portable set of those eye binoculars rolls down from the ceiling, so now I'm getting not only the regular checkup and pap smear, but my eyes checked--simultaneously!

Sunday, November 19, 2017

My Only Blog About Blogging, Promise

I feel like I'm starting to adopt a John Cusack type of approach to blogging, as in now that I'm writing more online again, I find myself listing rules in my head for how people can deal with or interpret me and while that's all very humane and idealistic, it just doesn't work.

For me, this blog is a place for expressing myself in a creative, freer way than I can in other venues, such as work. I don't have one running theme or goal or agenda. I have self expression.

Like a lot of people who are probably more...what do they call it? more...oh, right, "free-spirited" than a traditional employer or client might be, I can only hope my self expression will not be unappealing, though I understand this is inevitable and take no offense at not being someone's cup of tea; you might not be mine, either, and I say that with no bitterness (maybe a little tartness, but bitterness? Nah).

What I worry about at times is that someone assessing me for a copyediting job or project will allow whatever they didn't like about my posts here to overcome other factors, such as my decades of experience, not to mention I've got references.

(Editor's Note: She's also looking for writing jobs or projects.)

In the more recent past, I've been more conservative about what I post online, even at this space, a way of approaching the open internet that shattered post-apocalypse, when I was displaced from New Orleans in September 2005. Though I didn't have a goal then other than finding a form of primal screaming that was at least interesting or maybe constructive, blogging worked in my favor since the writing I shared here opened doors for me to write for other publications.

On the editorial side, I had the same clients for a very long time, as in eight years or so, and then a few shorter-term contracts the last two years, so whatever I was doing here was a non-issue so far as my employment status went.

Now I'm on out on the career and client market and of course being run through the Google machine. The streams of work and creativity may cross and may or may not clash. But we're sort of post-apocalypse again here now, and Puerto Rico is unfortunate enough to be seeing unprecedented levels of it to this day, so I'm just not in the mood to worry about being Cusackian, much as I admire idealism and wanting to appeal to everyone (even the uptight).

However: 2017 has been too wild a ride not to have an outlet.

And look, I know this is probably unnecessary. But if any of my content on, say, sex, politics, feminism, dating, etc., makes you uncomfortable, be a good sport and pretend you didn't read it.

Or tell yourself it was my alter ego.

That's what I do.

Untitled

Must be lazy, unstructured
to work this way
I cannot summon the energy
to be who I was
yesterday.

Thursday, November 16, 2017

Centuries

Okay, so here's the thing: he was punishing her for not wanting him, then calling it comedy; you know that, right?

He had scripted a kiss into their USO skit that he wrote and then insisted on "rehearsing" the kiss, manhandling her in the process.

The photo was staged after this little bitter comedian's snit of his. And yet he was mad at her, not himself. Okay...so then he took that photo, waiting for her to fall asleep before doing so and sidestepping the part where she agrees to be touched, posed and/or photographed.

This is how male entitlement functions...

And then I heard and read some sad women-children today insisting that well, he didn't actually touch her breast, how could he, there was Kevlar covering it, and she was on Hannity so, uh, she's not credible and and and and you know as you're listening to this infuriating yet meaningless patter that, even if you could even focus to say what needs to be said and somehow get through to these sad women-children, they're too far gone. It's a waste of breath to tell them what you're actually hearing them say: I have no self respect and therefore no respect for other women.

I mean, would any of these minimizers want to experience that, for all the world to see, for all the world to tear apart? I doubt it. Or maybe they have and are fine now volunteering other women for the experience? Or maybe their tearing apart took place in private, maybe it's the secret these women-children are hiding from themselves, the way they prefer to be, since they seem too thin-skinned to hear other women talk about their own experiences...instead, it's the critique of the woman discussing the transgression, the trespass, or a declaration that it's not actually a transgression, a trespass, anything but a discussion of the actual thing that happened, that thing he chose to do.

Instead, it's this familiar circular firing squad that discourages women from speaking out, led in part by other women. Meanwhile, we've tried that for centuries and it's grown tired, this silence, tired...

Meanwhile, we've tried that for centuries, centuries...

One Otherwise Quiet Summer Day

Al Franken-inspired memory: that time a guy friend grabbed my breast just as the flash went off for the group picture someone was taking.


Other guy friend turns to me after and says, tskng at me, "I can't believe you let him just do that."

Uh huh.

I'm not defined by these experiences, though there are enough that I forget some from time to time, until, like today, I see a photo that brings one or the other back.

I'm not shocked or accepting of these behaviors, so I certainly don't need to be fawned over like I'm fragile, or told I'm lying, or any of the standard-issue sexist talk-overs. What I need are not only workplaces but lifespaces where men are not excused for harassing, ogling, grabbing, etc. As a woman, I'm the one who's been dealing with this reality without blinders, for years, for my whole life, starting as a child, age 10, when an older man exposed himself to me and a friend at my elementary school one otherwise quiet summer day, when we were riding bikes there, cutting through, pedaling faster, faster away.

Contrary to the ugly backdrop these encounters knit around us women, I'm very glad to be a woman. For starters, I don't hinge my identity and behavior on contempt for half the planet.

There's a clarity and freedom in that.

A strength.

A lack of regret.

A peace no grabber or hater can ever grasp.