2C (not two cents)

30th October 2009

Text

a game of whisper down the lane

this blog is entirely JJ’s fault. i told him he was going in my blog and he laughed. hmmmmm. apparently the threat of a blog no one knows about isn’t terribly motivating… :)

so, i wrote a fair chunk of my master’s thesis in February, away from home. some of it was a Salty Senorita and some of it was on the return of JJ’s desk in his office. everyone knows me there. they stop in to say ‘hi’ and ask when i’m coming back. i say “never,” or i say, “i’m not even here now.” we all laugh. it’s a ritual.

i noticed that Hatch, a friend in the office, was leaving work on a relatively normal schedule on Friday nights. this is unheard of in software. JJ told me that Hatch, when questioned about leaving before nightfall on a friday, responds with, “I’m headed north for the weekend.” i witnessed this a couple of times and told JJ that i thought Hatch had a girlfriend who worked in our offices.

JJ apparently told another friend, Erik, that i suspected Hatch was seeing someone from the office. JJ reported to me last night (so, this is 8 months later) that Erik had been snooping around and has discovered some circumstantial evidence connecting Hatch to a lovely woman in the office. Erik reported this to Hatch to report to me.

i was stunned. first JJ told Erik i’d read someone’s nonverbals and determined office romance? then Erik, whose highly technical, high-level job requires every ounce of his attention, somehow has not forgotten this piece of gossip and actually made a small effort at sourcing it? and finally, they’re both very amused that i tagged Hatch, who has managed not to slip up about his secret for more than 8 months? bad! bad i say!

ok, in hindsight, i can see how this is *kind of* my fault. if Hatch wanted us to know about the office romance, he would have told us. on the other hand, it’s kind of hard for me to turn off the watching. it’s not like i went through his desk or anything, i said goodnight to him on two sequential fridays. he could have looked less like a man slipping off to an illicit meeting, right?

the fault here is with JJ and Erik for being bad. yes. i said it, bad. next thing you know, there will be pranks to hint at Hatch that they’re onto him. but no one can reasonably pin the imminent mischief on me. i’m just saying.

Comments (View)

25th October 2009

Text

performing femininity

i’m in the middle of a conversation about an instance of a woman reporting her miscarriage on Twitter. it’s a grad class discussion. i don’t think it’s falling in my favor.

issues of whether or not i want Trunk anywhere near my sibs and their fertility issues aside, i have to say that i’m aggravated by the backlash linked to notions of “propriety.” she’s supposed to be heartbroken and she’s supposed to keep it a secret.

these “supposed to”s presume 1) that all women want children and 2) that women’s bodies are in some way unspeakable.

i have a number of issues with these two assumptions, but the one i’m pointing to here is about the inappropriateness of a miscarriage at work which inconveniently complicates our notions of women’s bodies at work.

it’s hard to argue with me about the points that come next because i’ve been swimming in corporate waters a long time. the corporate hierarchy-competition model mimics the social models of heterosexual masculinity. this is a cultural model that delineates women as sexual objects by definition. at work, our sexuality is never off stage. but maternity is another matter, isn’t it?

who can decide what is and isn’t “appropriate” where women’s bodies are concerned?

i have never wanted to be a mother. it doesn’t make me shallow, mean, selfish or broken. although i’ve been told all of those things and more. i don’t really like children. and i don’t think it’s a great idea to launch my own family on the hope that “it’s different when they’re your own.”

i agree that children are central to our communities, that children should be safe, protected, healthy and educated, and that it is the moral obligation of all of us to see to it that all these needs are met. it’s why i spend so much time and resources advocating on their behalf. but it’s not guilt that drives me. it’s justice.

i’m not saying that i want to give up shoes and lip gloss. i just want to stretch the definitions a little. if you want to be parents, fine. if you love children, even better. don’t listen to the master myth that says my feelings invalidate yours. they simply don’t.

Comments (View)

20th October 2009

Text

unfortunate applications of the Bedazzler

ok, i don’t think of myself as particularly modest or conservative, but seriously, Miami has some personal taste issues.

i don’t care if you’re a man or a woman, child or adult, there is no rational reason for rhinestones on your pants.

why are you wearing stilettos on the boardwalk. wait. nevermind why. HOW are you wearing those shoes on the boardwalk without breaking your heel or your ankle?

who first thought, i know, i’ll smash up mint, lime and sugar, then i’ll add rum and ice, and it will be great!? it’s like alcoholic candy in a glass. it’s wrong. and minty.

and there are entirely too many chandeliers here. they’re an impractical mode of lighting for anyone over 5’5”.

also, all of your notions of swimwear need to be rethought. all of them.

and jewelry. you people were a lot of jewelery. a lot. and i’m from Scottsdale.

Comments (View)

14th October 2009

Text

ow! my eyes!

i have eye strain. it’s happened before when i work too many hours in a row, too many days in a row. usually, we’re talking more than two weeks straight and more than 12-14 hours per day. oh, wait. that’s been my life these last few weeks.

i’ve been reading a lot. a couple of books and a handful of articles per week. plus around 200 pages of student writing per week. i’ve been writing a lot too. all of it on my computer. it’s all fun and games until someone puts an eye out.

as usual, i need to figure out how to balance my work and my life. if permitted, i will do nothing but work and sleep. and not so much with the sleep. i’m not a perfectionist, i’m more a revisionist. i think of whatever i’m doing at the moment as the first pass. it can always be polished, rethought, more effective, whatever. i’m perpetually trying to get better at the things i do.

and i like the challenge.

but i haven’t spent much time with JJ lately. i’ve skipped too many Monday nights with the girls. i’m skipping game nights and Thursday nights because what i’m doing now is new, and i’m invested in the learning curve. it’s a shiny, new challenge for me.

i’m probably not going to even want to check my impulse to learn new skills and ideas. that’s just too much to ask of anyone. but i think i need to set some limits on how many hours a day i’m devoting to work. and when midnight rolls around and i decide i’d rather keep going thinking about sleep, i’ll try to check that impulse at least half of my nights. speaking of midnight … g’night.

Comments (View)

13th October 2009

Text

what would Neo do?

i’m introducing my students to critical lenses of race and gender this week.

there’s a funny story about how i was showing a slide consolidation of the consumer markets they’d associated themselves with (it was a homework assignment). many of my students tagged themselves as gamers, but one mentioned that gaming is marketed directly to males through the way it leverages female sexuality. in my slide presentation, i included game images alongside an image of the Frag Dolls, Ubisoft’s competitive, title-winning team. my class thought they were some kind of “dance crew” to promote gaming. you know, like the Phoenix Suns Dancers. i’m not saying that i can’t see the confusion. mostly. i do think it’s funny, that Halo and Call of Duty apparently merit cheerleaders.

somehow the universe always arranges itself so that while i’m immersed in an idea for one class, project or paper, all of the other things i’m doing are also, coincidentally, trying to keep my head below the surface in the same pool of thought. while i’m talking to my students about sexuality in advertising, i’m rehashing Butler in pedagogy and defending conflict within a feminist dialectic in comp. i’ve somehow managed to round all the bases of contemporary feminism over the weekend.

last night, i was with my Monday night girls. they’re different from the Tuesday night girls in that the Monday night girls are about craft and relationship and the Tuesday night girls are about alcohol and performance. yes, i also see the irony.

last night, we were talking about the power of passive-aggressive speech patterns. i won’t use them when i’m working which has some of my students, who expect the maternal model of the high school teacher, finding me “intimidating” and “scary.” but i haven’t explained it to them. no more than i’ll explain that my default is always coalition building over competition but assuming that i’m not ambitious nor sure of my competence is faulty reductionism. it’s not that i don’t understand the masculine hierarchy, i simply reject being defined by it.

S points out that as long as she’s known me, i avoid these confrontations. she’s right. almost always, if you say or do something to me, unless we’re in my own home, that trips my alarms, i’ll simply let it go. if you’re hurting someone else, i’l likely get involved. but if it’s me, i think you’re either a well-meaning soul who forgot yourself for a second, and you’re just as trapped in Butler’s heterosexual matrix of power as the rest of us, in which case, why would i hold you responsible for that? or you’re another one of those people who leverages your position to silence others. in that case, you’re not worth my energy. S thinks as a champion, i’m a bit disappointing.

maybe.

Comments (View)

11th October 2009

Text

null value exception (updated 10/12)

today is National Coming Out Day 2009. Sam wanted me to donate my fb status to her cause. it would have read: My Name ” is gay. It is National Coming Out Day and I pledge to have heartfelt conversations for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender equality.”

i feel pretty bad about not doing it. fb isn’t exactly neutral territory and i don’t want to kick up sediment. at the same time i’m making snarky comments about women and pastries with niko and john on twitter, and i’m unconcerned about any potential fallout there. either i worry less about losing john and niko, or i believe they love me more than my fictive family on fb. i don’t think i want to consider those options too closely.

i’ve been thinking a lot about the protocols of networks. (i’ll skip all the theoretical parts because i’m the only one who thinks this stuff is interesting.) i’m free to make any choice. yet the outcomes of those choices are constrained by the choices of the people with whom i’m connected. i posted a fb status about losing and DG, and a girl from my gradeschool days, a woman who thinks of herself as one of my older sisters even though i haven’t seen her in more than 20 years, took it upon herself to jump, half-joking, to my defense. first, he isn’t someone i need to be protected from, and second, i wasn’t unhappy, i was playing with him. of course, he already knows both of these things.

her motives aren’t really to protect me but to try to re-establish (reinforce?) a social order and a hierarchy where she was important and loved. of course, i still value her. i loaned her my prom dress and helped her sew straps on it because she, like all of our sisters, was obsessed with modesty. i couldn’t lose her without losing them all, and then losing my sister, and then JJ’s family and then it all comes apart. possibly it would make the holidays easier though … :)

i don’t think i could lose john and niko. and shan and cara. and scribe and solace. and all the zombie slayers whose autumnal fest i’m missing. if all the words that have passed between us didn’t break us, precious little will. if anyone knows anything about the process of becoming, it is them. and that is why, actually, they’re so different than the fb people i grew up with. because those people from 20 years ago are almost exactly as they’ve ever been. they don’t know much about the struggle and the pain of finding your own path, whether you had to go to Leeds or culinary school to get there from here.

of 20 years ago, there is no going back to that place. it is behind us by decades of iteration. but that does not mean that she and our sisters won’t try. they’re the forces of protocol who wish to return us to a past that never really was. or wasn’t for me. i supposed they enjoyed, ok, i’m stopping here because if i have to think about church camp or volleyball or singing, the anxiety will choke me.

in this present, Sam and I are ride-sharing in the same direction. i should tell her that. at least we’re on our way together to get new tattoos. :)

i’m wandering. i had a point. it was about the thousand little steps between who i was and who i am. how it’s not a straight line. and along the way i passed over, around and through the paths of others. the way our fates are intertwined whether i wish it or not. how i can only travel so far with each choice before i have to negotiate the space with the choices of others. so, i can’t change my fb status to say that i’m gay and that i pledge to have heartfelt conversations for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender equality. and Sam likely knows i can’t because she’s caught in the same web of choices.

but it does have me thinking about whether or not i should, at this juncture, reconfigure my friends. all of this remembering my audience and parsing my words is exhausting. and i get tired of serving as a place holder for people who take more than they give.

update 10/12:

Sam has this to say:

I half expected people to freak out here & that is quite all right with me. The point of coming out is to live your life in truth. I’m still working on that part. It’s a difficulty. To say that self-awareness has been the biggest struggle of my adult life would be an understatement. There’s a lot of guilt & denial & blame & anger… I’ve known since I was little way before we even met but I just couldn’t define it. How could I-growing up in a seminary & I was utterly boy crazy!

Comments (View)

2nd October 2009

Text

blackmail

what’s the deal with extortionists? how many cases have we seen this year alone?

my life and my history couldn’t bear up under even cursory scrutiny. could yours? doesn’t that make us hypocrites that we set the standard so ridiculously high for people in the public eye?

seems like some people should try to get day jobs.

Comments (View)

28th September 2009

Text

a hundred things to do

at the end of the day, there are always dozens of more things on my list. i feel like i’m behind on everything, except for when i think people are late, don’t answer my email, won’t call me back, etc.

so, i’m not so certain that i’m behind. i’m starting to wonder if i’ve adopted the digital standard of immediacy. if it’s not down now, if all the status bars aren’t full, i’m behind.

so, what to do about it? i’m thinking of starting with breakfast and working from there.

Comments (View)

25th September 2009

Text