My Confession

I feel as though it's time for me to make a confession.  Embarrassed as I am, I feel it needs to be brought forth, and I can only hope that time will heal any wounds, and repair any damage I might be about to incur to my friendships.  I hope you will read with patience, love, and understanding, along with a great willingness to forgive.

*sigh*

Here goes.

I don't like Star Wars.  

I feel so dirty.
The bare truth is, I haven't seen it since I was a kid.  I tolerated it, when one of my fathers watched it relentlessly for days and days.  Yoda was cute, even tho I thought he talked "funny", and I liked those little furry Ewok things that looked like bears.  Beyond that, it either bored me cross-eyed, or scared me shitless.  The idea of a person being crammed into the warm bowels of some kind of llama/horse crossbreed, in order to keep from freezing to death while one is abandoned in the desert...this is intense for a highly-imaginative child with abandonment issues.  Let's go a step further and just blame every panic attack I have ever had on that scene.  Another thing.  Why the hell is it snowing in the desert in the first place?  The weather in the Star Wars world is terrifying.
And what the fuck was with that huge hole in the ground, that had teeth, and chewed up anyone unfortunate enough to fall in?  If it's not bad enough that you're going to plummet to your demise, you get to be partially digested, and full of holes when you get there.  Fuck.
And let's not forget, of course, the fact that Luke's own father severs his hand during a sword fight.

While I'm out here on this limb, let me also make it known that I hated Star Trek.  I would moan audibly with extreme displeasure whenever I saw that goofy spaceship fly toward me in the opening sequence, and I could not change the channel fast enough.  When you're a kid with three channels to choose from, and some boring shit like that comes on, your afternoon TV watching is pretty much brought to a standstill.  And you're forced to find entertainment elsewhere.  Usually in the form of screaming at your sister.  Or maybe that was just my house.
Old Star Trek, new Star Trek, it doesn't matter.  I hate them all.  I hate Spock's pointy ears.  I hate Warf's twisted face.  I'm not sure what character Whoopi played, but I'm pretty sure I hate that one, too.  Reading Rainbow guy was tolerable, but only because I knew he'd be back later to read me some stories, and that he wouldn't be wearing a banana clip over his eyes when he did...

Take a look.  It's in a book.  

This, of course, leaves me feeling awkward and dishonest, when one of my friends (who all seem to be Star Wars/ Star Trek devotees), shows me the newest kickass item on their wishlist, in the form of a toilet seat that makes a Jaba The Hut noise when you sit on it.  Usually, I try and churn out some sort of neutral phrase that won't out me as the most uncool person on the planet.  "Oh, wow!  It's perfect for you!"   (I don't know if Jaba the Toilet Seat is  a real thing.  Fuck, I hope not...)

Since I'm coming out of the closet, so to speak, I'll also confess to never having seen Top Gun.  Or ever having the desire to see Top Gun.  As my husband said, "I saw Hot Shots first.  That was enough for me."  So, unless Ducky Dale is in Top Gun, cross-eyed with huge thick glasses, I remain steadfast in my desire to never see it.

I hope I've earned cool points for at least pretending to give a fuck, for knowing what a wookie is, and for thinking your Princess Leia costume is cool.  Mostly.  I hope my appreciation of Space Balls earns me a pass with at least a few of you.
And lastly, I hope we can all still be pals, now that you know my disturbing secret.  

I am a teenage boy.

Fucking mom.  Cleaning my room is conformist.
I hate everything.

"I am a teenage boy.


I am sensitive and volatile, and will turn on you at the slightest opportunity.


I will deliberately show up late for dinner, simply because I know it annoys you, and because I wish to show you how much control I have over my own environment.


I will refuse to wash myself for days on end, and resent you violently when you suggest a shower.  I'll take one, but I will do so with great hesitation, and with an obvious display of my disgust for you.


I will use everything you say against you.  If you ask me to pay attention to you while you're speaking, I will stare at you angrily, as you talk, and I will refuse to look away.  If you comment on this behavior, I will treat you like a crazy person, and remind you that "YOU TOLD ME TO PAY ATTENTION!  I AM PAYING ATTENTION TO YOU, LIKE YOU WANTED!"


If you punish me for rudeness, I will make you feel like an asshole, by pointing out that I was "just joking!"


I will sigh, roll my eyes, and stomp my feet as I walk away from you during a lecture.  I will then deny all three when you punish me.


I will lie thru my teeth.  About everything.  Especially about schoolwork, the cleanliness of my room, and the last time I brushed my teeth.  You are not allowed to be angry with me, or to punish me, when you find out I've been lying.  If you try, I will sigh, roll my eyes, and stomp my feet as I walk away, and of course, I will deny all three.


I will work diligently at keeping an odd smell permeating from my bedroom.  This is both from lack of personal hygiene, and my refusal to wash my clothes.  I also will not wear deodorant.  Ever.  Your requests for a remedy to these things will lead to my refusal to speak to you, audible sighing, and eye rolling.  Again.
I will deny all three.  Again.


I will insist, regardless of the truth, that I did "nothing" all day at school.  If there is a bomb threat and three fires, I will still answer "nothing" when asked what I did at school on that particular day.  This will also be my answer when I am visibly sad, angry, or "emo", and you ask me what is wrong.  I will also appear to become more sad, angry, or "emo" after I am asked.  Your insistence that I can confide in you will lead to eye rolling.
Which of course, I will deny.


If you ask me to put on a coat, I will insist that it's not cold out.  Hypothermia be damned, I will not let you think you told me what to do.  This also applies to summertime, when you suggest I take off my black hoodie and put on some shorts.


I will deliberately disagree with you.  If you say something is black, I will say that it's gray.  Or very dark blue.  I will continue to look for an opportunity for disagreement in every single statement you make.  I am smarter than you.  You are stupid, everything you say is wrong, and I will prove it, regardless of the ludicrous statements I might have to make.


My life, and the things happening in it, are the greatest crises in human history.  No one has ever felt as sad as me.  No one has ever had problems as big as mine.  No one can relate, in any way, to anything I might be going thru.  I am the first.  I will be the last.  I am important in my suffering.


If forced to do chores, I will do so half-heartedly, in an effort to show you how bad I am at each particular task, hoping that you will stop asking me.  If you point out my half-hearted efforts, you are a jerk.  Eye rolling and sighing.


If I show interest in speaking with you, this is a trap.  Don't talk.  Do not offer input.  Just smile, and act like everything I say is the most ingenious bit of conversation you've ever heard.  Say nothing.  Or eyes will roll.  Again.


I am a teenage boy.  Your input is useless and resented.  Please just buy me food, clothes, and don't acknowledge me unless I speak directly to you, and maybe not even then.   Probably not even then."


*******


I am the mother of a teenage boy.


I am the most uncool person on the planet.


My grasp of the weather, namely "hot" vs. "cold", is entirely skewed, and I do not know the difference between "coat weather" and "shorts weather."


I am moderately paranoid, and I hallucinate signs of aggression, such as eye rolling, loud sighs, and being ignored.  I also hallucinate smells, such as armpit odor, dirty laundry, and general grossness.


My idea of  "clean" is warped, and I maintain unreasonable demands upon the tidiness of the rooms in my home.  Also note that I employ slave labor, and force my children to load the dishwasher, wash their own laundry, and clean their own rooms.  I am an unreasonable tyrant.  


Everything I say is drastically, and embarrassingly wrong.  I must be corrected on even the slightest infraction, such as, mispronunciation of a word, whether or not a movie is good, and what day of the week we last ate turkey.  I am a crazy person.  Or maybe I am just a moron."

"Crazy person."  See also "moron.  See also, "mother of a teenage boy."
Stupid, stupid woman.   

*******


Welcome to being the parent of a teenager.  Abandon all hope...


...for a little while.  Because sometimes, there are moments of absolute awesome.  When the kid you're sure is the biggest dickhead on earth suddenly reminds you that there's still a little bit left of your sweet baby boy, and that there's a little bit of him that's growing into a sweet man.
Sometimes.
It makes all the "I am a teenage boy" moments absolutely worth it.  Body odor and all.


I'll let you know when the next one of those moments arrives.

Potential hostage situation

Or, "A day in the life of an emotionally unstable, painfully sensitive, and probably premenstrual housewife." 


I'll let you in on a not-so-secret secret.  I might have a slight tendency to become just the smallest bit irrational.  A little sensitive and somewhat reactive.   Even approaching, sometimes, quite unhinged.  The timing of these events may, or may not coincide with what some might consider a hormone fluctuation known as "P.M.S."  Personally, I think this is largely an urban legend, and that a more believable explanation is that everyone and everything around me suddenly becomes an asshole once every month...

Examples...

*****

Me:  "WHY AREN'T THERE ANY GODDAMN CHIPS IN THIS HOUSE?!"

Frightened cat:  O.o

Frightened husband:  I think your son ate all the chips.

Me:  "DAMMIT!  HE'S the reason I can't have nice things!" 

Dear kid, don't be an asshole. 

*****

Me:  "JEEZUS, you're working late AGAIN!?" 

Frightened husband:  "I work nights.  It's just my shift." 

Me:  "What am I, too fat for you now?"

Frightened husband:  "I don't even..." 

Me:  "Are you having an affair with that woman in the office?!" 

Frightened husband:  "You mean the old lady with cataracts?" 

Me:  "Hey, bring me some chocolate when you come home, ok?  I love you so much!" 

Confused husband:  "I don't even..." 

Dear husband, don't be an asshole. 

*****

Me:  "WHAT THE?!  YOU STUPID PIECE OF GARBAGE!  WTF IS YOUR PROBLEM?!  IF YOU'RE NOT GOING TO WORK, THEN WTF GOOD ARE YOU?!  JEEZUS I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHY I PUT UP WITH YOU, YOU STUPID PIECE OF CRAP!!" 

Malfunctioning TV Antenna:  (Does not respond, due to being an inanimate object with no lips or vocal cords.  Also, probably, because it is an asshole.) 

Me:  "I WILL KILL EVERYONE IN THE WORLD!"

Dear malfunctioning TV antenna, don't be an asshole. 

*****

Me:  (Uncontrollable sobs)

Julia Roberts in Steel Magnolias:  (Dies.)

Me:  (continued sobs)

Julia Roberts in Steel Magnolias:  (Ignores my desperate wailing, either due to the fact that she's a movie character and can't hear me, or because she's an asshole.)

Dear Julia Roberts in Steel Magnolias, don't be an asshole. 

*****

There is also an entire conversation that takes place between my frightened husband, myself, and my bra, but I kind of come off looking like a weirdo, and the story usually ends with more of my sobbing, so we'll just save that one for another time. 
But, bra, don't be an asshole. 
Seriously, it would all be so much easier if everyone, and everything on the planet would stop being an asshole at the beginning of the month.  It's not nice, and it gives me headaches, and makes me crave chocolate like a Jerry Springer guest craves meth. 

This message is brought to you by the letters P, M, and S, which I assume stand for "pummel", "murder", and "stab." 

Thanks, Mom.

Our mother never spoke harshly about our fathers.

She had reason to do so.  She had plenty of ammunition, and would not have had to lie to us if she wanted to put our fathers down, and take away our admiration and love for them.

She didn't.

Our fathers did not live up to the patience and tolerance our mother showed them.  They did not deserve the kind words she spoke to us about them, and they did not deserve the veil she pulled over their failures and indiscretions.

But, she did that for us.

Ultimately, we grew up, and we decided for ourselves what kind of people our fathers were.  We came to our own conclusions, made up our own minds about whether or not we thought they were "good" people.  Their own actions, and not the musings of our mother, helped us to decide how we felt about our fathers.

My grandfather, who I adored above all others, would sometimes criticize my mother in front of me.  Regardless of my agreement with him, and even tho I knew he was entirely justified in his feelings, I defended her fiercely.  I became angry with him.  I knew he was right, and yet I felt hostility and resentment at his decision to voice his opinion about her, to me.
I believe that whatever is at the root of this angry reaction, is the very reason parents must not disparage one another, regardless of the situation.

Regardless of my current opinion either way about my fathers, I am grateful to our mother for giving us the choice, and for not working to sway our opinion one way or the other.    

It's important.
If I can sing praises of my mother for such a thing, it must be important.  

An uncomfortable truth...

Sexual assault.

Five syllables that have the capability to make a person cringe in awkward discomfort.

The act, I assure you, is infinitely more uncomfortable.

This isn't easy to write.  It's squirmy and weird, and will probably be just as squirmy and weird to read.  Still kicking around the possibility that I won't publish it.  It's scary...

It shouldn't be scary.  I did nothing wrong.  But such is the nature of sexually motivated crimes, that the victim can sometimes feel partially, or even entirely responsible.
I  am not responsible.  Partially, or otherwise.
The attacker is responsible.  The bystanders are responsible.  The victim is never to blame.  I am not to blame.

The ripple effect from this type of crime is infinite.  In an effort to understand some of my odd and frankly, unflattering behavior, I have often wondered if it isn't the result of this particular series of events in my past...the result of a combination of gross neglect at the hands of my mother, and the complete objectification, devotion, and sexual affection of my abuser...
There is the fear that, while I refuse any ownership in the crimes against me, it may have left an undeniable footprint in the path to the person I am today.
There is an inherent, and oftentimes subconscious need to be pleasing and accommodating.  A need to behave in a manner that is sexually welcoming, to the point of completely ignoring someone's inappropriate behavior, thinly-veiled manipulation, or  complete lack of respect for my personal boundaries.   There is a fear that I have subconsciously connected the dots, to reveal that the path to love and acceptance is sexual accommodation, at the cost of my own personal boundaries.

A dear friend revealed to me that since the day she was attacked, she doesn't feel particularly "allowed" to say no.  That submitting to sexuality against her better judgement or desire, is somehow less frightening than saying no, and risking the anger or hurt-feelings of the other party.  Allowing a person to objectify, manhandle, and otherwise misuse her person, is less personally offensive than the potential backlash of the other party.
Heartbreaking.  The feeling of loss of ownership over one's own personal boundaries.

Equally unnerving is the intense sense of inadequacy and neglect, when the immediate requirement of my sexuality is not apparent.  When there is the slightest sense that he might "have a headache", a wave of loneliness and fright wash over me, as does the violent sensation of being absolutely neglected, and useless.
Because, after all, this is why I'm here, right?

No.
Rationally, no.
However, because of this...thing, this crime rooted somewhere in my past a hundred years ago, there is a constant struggle to place the rational above what feels real.  There is a constant inner argument between the two sides, forever trying to determine my role in every single relationship from then until now.

This said, I am not a victim.  This cliche is true.  I'm not a victim, I'm a survivor.  I hold no ownership in what happened.  The man who attacked me holds the responsibility, along with the adults around me, who looked the other way.  I am blameless.  This is true of any survivor of sexual assault.  Regardless of their manner of dress, their decision to allow some level of sexual contact, regardless of their level of intoxication, their prior sexual history...

I still hold every right over my own sexuality, whether I choose to display it overtly, whether I choose to keep it solely for myself, or whether I fall somewhere in the middle.  I still hold every right over the power of "no."  I still hold every right over my body, and it holds immeasurable value, whether or not I behave to accommodate.  This is the reality.  I know this.

My hope for myself, and for my fellow survivors of these heinous acts,  is that, while we may continue to struggle on some level with the ripple effect, we will more often be able to place the rational above what feels real.

#FatGirlStripperNames

If you visit Twitter this afternoon, along with "GotAids" and "ChelseaClinton", you'll find "FatGirlStripperNames" as a trending topic.
Basically it means that enough people are talking about a specific thing for it to become a popular subject on the website.  Apparently, the Fat Police are in full force on Twitter this afternoon, and have all come together to apply stereotypes, ridicule, and downright nasty names to fat women, who choose exotic dancing as their livelihood.

Because fat people have no feelings.  Because it's ok to make fun of fat people.  Because a fat person deserves our ridicule.  Especially those who dare to express their sexuality and confidence in a way that is normally only acceptable for "normal" people.

Because a body shape that drifts too far away from the accepted norm, deserves to be dehumanized and devalued.

Because "fat" is an ugly, bad bad word.

I've said it before, and I'll continue saying it.  Anyone who ridicules another person has their own issues to attend to.  It's not anyone's responsibility to look a certain way in order to please anyone else.  A fat person is entitled to their fat.   They are entitled to be fat in public places.  They are entitled to be fat in revealing clothing.  Even a step further, they are entitled to be fat sexually.

Being fat doesn't always mean a person's ass is super-glued to the couch, while they mainline gravy, and snort powdered doughnuts.  Sometimes it means "regardless of a healthy level of physical activity, and healthy food, my body is meant to be a fat one."
And sometimes, being fat means "I don't like exercise.  And I like spoonfuls of sugar and syrup on my  foot-high stack of pancakes."
Sometimes, being fat means a mixture of both scenarios.
Either way, the fat person in question has the right, as anyone else does, to either scenario.

Being fat doesn't mean "unhealthy."  Because, as much as the Fat Police would like to believe otherwise, fat is not an indicator of health.  It just isn't.  No amount of ridicule will make it so.
Even if fat were a sign of gross internal sickness, fat shame and fat ridicule is still unjustified.

No one, regardless of whether they're 800 pounds or 80, deserves to be defined by their shape or size.  No one.   No one has the right to decide the "right" shape or size of my body.  No one has the right to make assumptions about my health or happiness, based solely upon the plumpness of my back side.

Being fat does not cost non-fat people more money, regardless of media hype.
Being fat does not insulate a person from normal, human emotions.
Being fat does not, in any way, affect a non-fat person in a way that causes damage or discomfort.  If it does, it's the problem of the non-fat person, and means they should take the stick out of their asses, and grow up already.

If I choose to cover myself from head to toe in frumpy burlap, or if I choose to dance a strip-tease on my dining room table, it's my right.  Whether I'm fat or thin, it's my right.

It certainly doesn't warrant anyone nicknaming me "Quarter Pound-her" or "Notorious KFC".   Ultimately, those names have nothing to do with the fat person, and everything to do with the insecure dickhead who assigns them.

My fat is not your problem.  Even if I'm scantily clad in public, my fat is not your problem.  I promise.  Really, really.

If all else fails, and reasoning is lost on such people, use the damn swivel on your neck, and look away.  Preferably into a book, because your ass could use some learnin'.

I am not this

Most of the time, I am above it.
Greater than.
Moved beyond.

Most of the time I am free from it, far removed, and lifted up by my triumph over the past.

Most of the time...

And then, without warning, it becomes all I know.  It becomes all I am.  It defines me.
I am this.
This is why I'm here.  This is what I am for.

Less than a person.  Less than an object, even.  Less than.

The ripple effect is endless.  And violent.

The insomnia will pass.  I'll be silly and squirrely again.  And I'll know better.  I'll be free from it, far removed, and lifted up by my triumph over the past.

I'm not eight years old.  And I'm not helpless.  And I'm loved by someone who will choose to protect me.  And I am more than this.  It does not define me.