September 2002

 September 1 2002                                                      9:41 AM 

I usually like This American Life but yesterday's was GREAT. They talked about testosterone. It was so great. The problem was that I usually have this stuff on in the background while I'm writing. I was hanging on every word of this show. I stopped writing all together.

Yesterday was a course in how to avoid writing. It was truly amazing to me, even as I lived through it, how many things I just HAD to do rather than write. I finally settled in the afternoon and got some done. Was it any good? Uh...

But the testosterone thing was great. It's not a girls=good boys=bad thing. We all have testosterone. They interviewed a man who had his testosterone suppressed for an unspecified medical reason. I swear the state of consciousness he described was like the way they describe satori. And they interviewed a female to male transsexual who talked about the effect testosterone injections had on his relationship to women. It was so interesting. You can listen to it on line. Now.

I keep getting counters and I could never figure out how people knew how people got to their sites via Google searches. I got a new one last week and now I know. It's kinda fun. I don't have that much traffic but someone came here from searching on men are complicated. I love that!

And I should thank Willa since I get the most hits from her link list.

I forgot to remind you about Rabbit Rabbit. But you should really subscribe to the reminder. It's so fun. Heather is on vacation so Judith did it this month. Don't worry. Just say tibbar tibbar tonight.

I don't think I wrote about the family who went to the Portland protest and were pepper sprayed. I've been talking about a lot. I heard the father interviewed on Democracy Now. It's shocking to me how many people want to scold the parents for taking their children to the protest and not say a word about the police. Taking a child to a protest is the choice on an individual parent and I wouldn't second guess that choice. I also think that parents ought to be able to take their kids to a demonstration with out fear of the people whose job it is to protect them.

Today. On Book TV. The mighty mighty Howard Zinn. I am psyched.

September 2 2002                                                      8:53 AM 

Got to listen to Howard for a while before going to the fat women's swim. It was Deb's birthday so we went to Oliveto's for lunch. It was a really nice day.

Dru blogged a conversation about a Joe Boxer ad. I reacted to the ad the first time I saw it. The guy is cute and the music is up beat and there is a giggly quality to the whole thing. At the same time it seemed a little too step-n-fetchit for me. But then I'd wonder why I felt that way. Are Black men suppose to be stoic and reserved? Dru has collected some quotes from a number of African American men talking about how the commercial made them feel. And then some people tell them to lighten up. Lighten up? It gives me chills. I'm truncating and paraphrasing. Read it. It's compelling.

In the testosterone thing I was talking about yesterday there was this thing said about testosterone getting men in trouble. That they'd say things that would get them into trouble. It reminded me of the recent babe controversy. What's that about? Getting into trouble?

I hope that when I talk to people about things that are sexist, racist, homophobic, fatist, what ever...I hope that don't front off like some mama with a whippin stick. I mean how are we going to get clear if we don't talk to each other? Nobody is in trouble. We're just talkin here. Right?

I ended the day as I had begun it. Listening to Howard. Lovely.

It is Labor day. Jessamyn has some thoughts and great links. I met David Bacon a few years ago. He does good work.  

Gotta work on writing now. It's due tomorrow. Wish me luck.

September 3 2002                                                      9:36 AM 

What is going on?

Ralph Nader was on CNN. And then. Barbara Ehrenreich was on MSNBC. Amazing. Of course the Crossfire boys were chaotic and reductive but Nader held his own. Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on how you think about it, a friend called me and I didn't get to listen to the part of the show where they talked about the fast food stuff. Because if I had watched it (and not just read the transcript) I'd have to rant about how much I don't like fast food and I am fat and many fat people who I know do not eat fast food. And many do. I'd have to go on and on about how these guys talk about fat people as if we are the most disgusting, repulsive creatures in the known universe. They do this in a public forum. And there is little public out cry about the limited understanding, stigmatizing, mean spirited nature of their conversation. I'd have to get all worked up and rant. But I didn't see that part.

I did get the writing done. I like some of it. The reading is great. This book is giving me the spins. I keep calling Suzanne and making her listen to it so I can talk about it.

I was reading Justin this morning. Which I don't do that often. I have claimed him as my blogfather (and Willa as my blog mother. I remain childless. Sniff.) but sometimes I feel old when I read him. I dunno. But he had a link to one of my favorite poems. It's that kinda thing that makes me go back.

I should say that the poem is one of my favorites because, back in the day, a man with whom I was much enamoured, used to recite it. And, despite the problematic and possibly misogynistic bits of the poem, and despite the problematic and definitely misogynistic bits of the man who recited it, it makes me smile to remember it all.

I mean, I feel estranged from people sometimes. People in general, and people with whom I have real time relationships, and people who I read on the web. I go through all these internal changes and they never know. Heh.

It doesn't take much to set me off and it doesn't take much to bring me back. Just a link to a poem.

September 4 2002                                                      10:36 AM 

I didn't love school that much last year. I loved parts of it. I loved the classes and  the reading. I loved people. But I had some trouble with the workshopping. I still feel a little defensive. But I actually think it might be OK. For one thing, the writing I'm doing is the kind of writing my classmates like to read. And working on the BSWP THE BOOK this summer made that OK for me. In other words, I'm telling a story in THE BOOK. It's narrative. What ever. I'm not worried that people won't understand what I'm trying to do. I'm not trying to do anything. I'm just telling a story.

But feeling better about school is about more than all that.  The reading is what's turning it around for me. I love the way this guy writes. I wish I could write like that. I love the structure, the rhythm of the writing, the way in which he draws no conclusion but rather poses possibility. I have issues with the some of the possibilities he poses. But I love it.

I'd like to write something like that. Right now, I'm not sure what to write about. I can keep working on THE BOOK, or I could take a break. I've even thought about writing about blogging. But I'm not sure what to write about that would really set me off.

This is probably not at all clear. It's still not clear in me. I still feel a bit ... (sorry. I love the dots.) ...out of place in school. Er, sumthin. But it's better.

Speaking of school. I try to remind everyone to listen to Pattie and Carl's show on Thursday's. On CFUV. At noon. My time. Sometimes I forget. But today I have a vested interested. I'm gonna be on the show! Pattie interviewed me. Talking about school. And she interviewed Suzanne too. Tada! Now if I can get Kell to put me in a movie ... 

The issues of war and peace cannot be melted down into a naive psychology of 'peace through better understanding among peoples'. It is not the aggression of people in general but their mass indifference that is the point of their true political and psychological relevance to the thrust toward war. It is neither the 'psychology of peoples' nor raw 'human nature' that is relevant; it is the moral insensibility of people who are selected, molded, and honoured in the mass society.

                                                                  - C. Wright Mills

You deplore the demonstrations taking place In Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations. I am sure that none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes. It is unfortunate that demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham, but it is even more unfortunate that the city's white power structure left the Negro community with no alternative.

                                              - Martin Luther King

September 5 2002                                                      8:53 AM 

I've gone epigraph crazy. I know.

I got e-mail from Nancy Pelosi. She's happy that I wrote to her to tell her that I do not support a war in Iraq. She believes we need to proceed with great caution. No congress woman. We do not need to proceed at all.

I'm so frustrated.

Yesterday. Wrote stuff. Went to school. Watched American Family. Including the portrait of the Sorro family. The parents were married at the I Hotel.

Every once in a while I try to participate in a conversation on the web most often occurring in the cluster of bloggers I stumbled upon a year ago or so. I am generally ignored. It used to bug me. It probably still does. I decided it was a slight to the people who do read me to keep shouting and waving at the kids in the school yard who were ignoring me. But just like the Joe Boxer conversation got me thinking and feeling and responding there has been this protracted conversation about sexism. Protracted because, I suspect, it began with all this.

There are times when I just don't want to talk to men about sexism. It makes me tired.

Yeah. Keep your glossy mags. Ignore what woman are telling you about the way it feels to have other women's bodies, airbrushed, Photoshopped bodies, set the standard for beauty and desirability. Don't worry about the young women who stop eating all together because their boyfriends make a comment about someone being fat. Don't imagine the damage to their health that not eating, or eating and puking will do to their bodies. Some of which will be irreparable.

I've slipped into my own agenda here a bit but hey...what the fuck? I live in a box. I live in the fat girl box. I have my own version of the grunch. It's one where the guys stick their head out the window and yell things about my body and it feels much the same way.

And I am TOO sexy for my box.

I was all wound up and serious and now I'm laughing so hard. Ahhhhhhhhhh. That felt good.

I moved the link to the Daily Summit here.

Pattie and Carl's show. Today. On CFUV. At noon. My time. I'm gonna be on the show. Talking about school.

September 5 2002                                                      11:56 AM 

And another thing.

I read a woman on the web talking about women's bodies in the gym. I'm not going to go into her space and say this but I'm pissed. And this is my space. She sees the fat ones (you know the ones that look like me) and she wonders how they got that way.

Well. They got that way because they have a some stuff in their DNA that codes for a tenancy toward fatness. Then, of course, they are women and have a biological need for weight to build up in certain areas of their bodies. Something about protecting the progeny. Factor that into your plan for perpetuating the species.  Then some of them began dieting early in early in life, as teenagers, or even got put on diets as small children when their parents got worried about their chubby little baby thighs. But they got tired of living with so much restriction and hyper awareness of food. They stopped paying attention. They regained the weight. They went on another diet. Fucked up their metabolism so bad their bodies aren't sure what to do any more. Some of them had kids and spent so much time and energy taking care of their children's bodies and their husbands bodies that they neglected their own bodies. They were too exhausted to go to the gym. They grabbed quick easy food on the way to taking their kids to a soccer match. Some of them just like chocolate cake and aren't interested in exercise. Some of them still love their bodies. Some of them have the temerity to imagine that their body is none of your business. Some of them ate plenty of veggies and fruit and fish before they ate the cake. And when you saw them at the gym, that was one of the three times a week they go, because they know they'll feel better if they do. For some of them your congratulations is unwelcome. You imagine that they are working to make themselves smaller because that would be the moral thing to do. That's not why they're there. They don't give a fuck what you think about the size of their ass. Some of the ones you don't see at the gym don't go because they know what you're thinking when you look at them and they don't feel safe in the line of your gaze. There is not just one kind of ... them.

But don't worry. Being fat isn't contagious. you can relax in the superiority of your efforts to never let yourself...get THAT way.

Second post of the day. I never do this. But I'm pissed off. It's almost noon. Is your radio on?

September 6 2002                                                      8:43 AM 

I've been talking about the book we're reading for class and how much I love the writing and the intellect. I do. And much of the content troubles me. I'm still struggling to understand why. There are no quick easy conclusions drawn in this book. It's a lovely and complex thesis. And some of it feels off.

I feel almost worried to try and represent what he saying. I'm still not sure I'm getting it all. But something he wrote about Black women poets in the early days of the Black power revolution rang loud to me as I went through my blog roll today.

This is out of context but it is a part of his text that haunts me. I don't want to belive it. It feels bad in my body when I read it.

Over the past few weeks I've watched as two woman bloggers gave voice to something that they felt. Then I watched while male bloggers reacted, defended, diminished, picked at the syntax, made parody, cried foul. Some women bloggers rushed to defend the men. Some turned on each other. Things pulled away from the center, the context mutated, rhetoric flew.

And the women, who had taken the risk to give voice to their feelings, I keep wondering if they feel heard.

I've said many times that I am always mindful of the systems we live in. I blame the systems for making it so hard to wake up. But we do need to wake up.

Is that what happens? When a woman puts her heart out and speaks directly about her pain, is she really asking Daddy to shut her up? Shut her up with kisses? Move over her with passion and consumption? Silence her with his adoration?

I'm crying while I write this. I feel rage, grief, loss, fear. I feel this. Deal with it. Don't deal with it.

September 8 2002                                                      8:55 AM 

Friday was odd. Saturday morning I did my blog stroll and thought ...ahhhhh...what the fuck. It's the first time I haven't posted in a ...actually I think it might be the second time I haven't post since I started this project. Ironic since I went to bed on Friday very early with a pile of books and mags and read most of the night, all the while thinking how amazing people are when they write. But on Saturday morning I wasn't feeling amazing. I was feeling hopeless.

I know the September 11 stuff is wearing on me. I've been crying a lot. There is reason to cry. But what I resent is the media stir up of grief and anger in a not even veiled attempt to kick up patriotism. Or at least sales of flag paraphernalia. Someone made a joke about Hallmark making 9/11 cards. Well they're calling it Patriot day. And they are making cards.

Chilling.

It's embarrassing to live in such a narcissistic country. With all the horror in the world phrases like - the day the world changed - are tossed around. The world is always changing. The change does not pivot on our loss.

K2 came over to bring me Kobi food. He made some pasta sauce and brought me some already chopped veggies to add, and fresh pasta from a place he goes to in Berkeley, the name of which I forget. And some gelato and fruit. I'm going to feast on it all today. I made a pizza with tapanade, chicken, artichoke hearts and fontina. We ate some pizza and chatted.

I listened to 911 festival on KPFA. That many people and my sore knees made it too much of a worry for me to actually go. And that made me a little sad.

I spaced out all day. I'm not feeling amazing today. But. Some how the effort seems to be important.

September 9 2002                                                      9:08 AM 

We're reading a bunch of journal entries for class. A journal of the plague year by Defoe, which is not a fun read. A Writer's Diary, Virginia Woolf, who I think might have been a great blogger. Wole Soyinka, writing about fasting in prison and Sue Hubbell, from A Country Year. I read napped and read and napped. I'm going to need to reread it all.

Ate Kobi food. Yum. He gave me so much that I'll be eating it today as well. Not a problem. I ate all the vegetables and the gelato and fruit. But I have pasta and sauce enough for one, or maybe two, meals.  

Drifting.

Willa has been playing with her SIMS and linked to a bunch of fan sites. It amazes me how creative folks are. By eight I gave up on reading and downloaded some stuff for my Monks. Now they can do Kung Fu, meditate and paint on different easels. It was fun to space out and play.

The radio and television might need to stay off. But I'm too addicted. Noah Grey won't have them on. When they're on I'm either mad or crying. Even when it's Chomsky on CSPAN. I keep thinking, I didn't lose a friend or family member. Is it disingenuous to feel so emotional? And I am not going along with this national mourning thang. It's too crass.

But something did happen.

Last night I dreamed I was hanging out with Chomsky and Amy Goodman.

September 10 2002                                                      9:08 AM 

Is this beside the point or is it me?

The first time I saw the commercial it made me tense. Frankly, there aren't many commercials that don't make me tense. It seemed problematic in terms of race and representation in obvious ways. But I also thought the guy was cute and the music and his goofy ness made me laugh. I see why people like it.

But when Dru blogged about it I reacted. I reacted to the feelings of the men. It bothered them. I understood why. I didn't hear any of them ask for a boycott of the stupid underwear. They just said things about how the stupid commercial for the stupid underwear made them feel. Not simple stuff.

Oh but ya know KMART was just trying to be " sexy, irreverent and fun".

What ever.

And I reacted to the people saying things to the guys like ... lighten up. WHAT THE FUCK? Lighten fucking up? So, now Slate tells them the same thing. I'm just gonna swing out and bet that none of these guys thought an ad agency went out looking for the guy who could look the most step n fetchit when he danced. And I'm not saying that Vaughn (oh goodgawd I can't believe I know his name) looks that way. I'm saying that it felt a little weird to watch, for me. And it felt bad for them.

I saw it again the other night. All I could think about was these guys.

I swear, lately I feel like no amount of writing or talking makes a difference. The sexism thing came and went. The men had the final word. It went something like..."don't you dare call us sexist." And now this is the way we talk about race in America. Aren't there a few other things to discuss?

I bet we can still have fun, make jokes, and be

 sexy, irreverent and fun with out having to be reductive.  

Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o'clock in the morning
Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the shadow
For Thine is the kingdom
Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the shadow
Life is very long
Between the desire
And the spasm
Between the potency
And the existence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow

                                        -  TS Elliot

September 11 2002                                                      10:12 AM 

I'm having a break down.

Yup.

It's making it hard to want to write.

I guess if I was really having a break down I wouldn't even try to write. Writing is the thing I do to fend off the breakdown. To discredit the drone of alienation in my heart. So I am writing.

On Sixty Minutes this week they did a bit focusing on women and children who had lost fathers on September 11. Yesterday Oprah did a show with a women who was badly burned and is fighting to recover. Every day there are stories. My eyes are burning from daily crying.

And I keep wondering what it does to your grief process to have it become fuel for nationalism.

I am listening to KPFA while I write. They are talking about the way the media is talking about it all. No mention of the women and children in Afghanistan who lost fathers. No mention of the men and children who lost mothers. No mention of the people who worked in the towers, undocumented labour, people who are not counted and their families who are not interviewed by Mike Wallace. No mention of the things going on in the rest of the world.

The American narrative is like reading the diary of teenager. We think the things that happen to us are bigger that anything going on with any one else.

Clearly we need to talk about what happened. But I want us to talk about the things going on in the world. I want us to think and feel deeply about it all. I want us to ask our selves questions about our greed and consumption. I think we have to cry. And I think we have to wake up.

I really did lose it yesterday. I feel helpless and hopeless and ineffective. I don't feel smart enough or articulate enough or fast enough. I don't feel strong enough.

And these are the feelings that I need to notice and then push through.

Somehow.

Our grief is not a cry for war.

I lived in New York for a while. I loved it. I worked in a restaurant in the financial center. I took a subway to the Trade Towers and walked across a bridge to go to work. The last time I was there I was hugging a boy. I loved him. He loved someone else. A friend of ours walked up and said, "Hey, you two look great together." We looked at each other and laughed.

What else could we do?

September 12 2002                                                      9:22 AM 

I wrote this for a class last year.

I remembered it all yesterday.

Midway through the day I became anxious. I couldn't focus on anything. I turned on the Sundance Channel and there was a movie that seemed to have just begun. I was having trouble focussing on it but somehow it sucked me in. It sucked me in because it was about love. Falling in love. Being surprised by love. It was pretty sweet and happy and hopeful. When it was over I needed to get ready to go to school. San Francisco was beautiful and sunny. I felt a kind of peace. Class was OK. I came out into the thick swirling fog and, again, it was beautiful.

I remembered that trip to Green Gulch. And the peace.

But I can't stop feeling like there is work to do. I don't know how to stop this. I write letters. I voted. I stand in the street with the people who are saying no. Why does it feel as if it's going to happen no matter what?

What can I do?

I want to believe in love. I want to breathe in the peace. But the clench, the tightness, will not release.

September 13 2002                                                      9:22 AM 

April has this great project. I'm doing it. My partner is Lisa. It's always interesting getting to know people through text and graphics. Lisa posted I fight like a girl. I love that.

I forgot to post about the Pattie and Carl show. It was pretty great. Carl interviewed Alan Clements who has a very nice web site.

Suzanne brought Lucca sandwiches over for lunch. It wasn't until she was on her way that I remembered that it was her birthday. DOH. Her computer is sick again so she can't even read me smacking myself in the head.

And then Caroline interviewed a woman from International A.N.S.W.E.R. I'll be in the streets tomorrow.

I had all this fussy, at the desk stuff that I needed to do all day. But it was good to be distracted.

September 14 2002                                                      8:05 AM 

Here's the truth. I spent the whole day playing. Yeah. It started with me thinking about a design for a Buddhist temple. And then ... I dunno. The day went by.

There are two things that hook me into this game. I really love designing the houses. There are houses that you can download but I love figuring out where to put stuff,picking wall paper, floors, making gardens. It scares me how much I like it.

And I tell myself stories while I'm playing. I've been trying to get one of my monks married. He courted one women, unsuccessfully. So, he went after another. He asked her to marry him at a party. Drew Carry was there. I guess his preoccupation with Drew pissed her off because she said no. So, he took her out for dinner and dancing and asked her again. This time she said yes.

There is one thing that I find odd. You used to be able to have same sex weddings in The Sims. Now, if the couple is same sex you only get the option to ask them to move in. Whadda ya think that's about?

 September 15 2002                                                      8:47 AM 

I did a focus group yesterday. I was paid 65 bucks to talk for two hours about what I wanted in a political leader and who I might vote for in terms of state representative. Geez. If I could get that kinda work on a regular basis my world would be ... uh ... weird. It was a little bit depressing. The way they wanted us to determine who we would vote for based on some pretty limited information. Like we read a few things. Quickly. It was interesting.

Politics in this country is rife with shuck n jive. Sigh.

It seems that they were trying to determine who might win for state senator when Burton terms out. The stuff they showed us on Willie was all about how was a poor kid who worked his way up and so much about race. Nothing about issues. I found this hugely irritating and I was not alone. The stuff they showed about Carol Migden was packed with issues and accomplishments.