God, I am the worst

What it's like being a woman in America

I am supposed to be on Day 20 of writing 30 Days of Poetry but I got interrupted by the mess of our country.

I’m trying to lean into my feelings, but my feelings have been trained to hide over the last many years of trauma. So I’ve been doing that instead.

Ultimately the main thought in my mind is that despite the all-around racism and anti-trans trans talk, the basis of this country is anti-woman.

That is: anti free women.

It’s easy to blame white women / women Trump voters for losing this election. (In fact, that’s part of the trap!) But, that is like blaming those with Stockholm syndrome for getting kidnapped.

Anti-female freedom is so entrenched in our country’s system of growth, it’s invisible. Gaslighting is the perfect term for it, because gas is invisible and it makes you sick and eventually kills you.

Here’s 1000 bucks. Go try and talk to any man about how fucked over women are in this country. See how that goes for you. SPOILER: You will have earned $1000 for the shortest conversation of your life.

I am 54 years old and I was born angry. Angry at the way women have to work twice as hard to never get what a man is handed. And I’m not talking about work: I am talking about that bare freedom to walk around in the world, safe.

I am sad for my daughters, but anyone who knows me knows I was sad for girls long before I had daughters. I tried my best with my son to raise a self-aware child. It only made him mad that I was trying to take away his freedoms.

There are so many people in this country who can’t go anywhere. They can’t afford it because life is expensive and capitalism ties you down. Yet they still think that who they are and what they believe is the BEST in the world.

They haven’t seen or met anyone else! How would they know?

NY Times columnist Bret Stephens — the day after the election — called Dems now the party of “prigs and pontificators.” It reminded me of how teenagers are always getting mad when their parents say “save your money!” “You don’t need 27 hoodies!” or “don’t text and drive” and the teenagers are like OH MAN WHAT DO YOU KNOW? MORON!

I have never said I know everything but one thing I have done is travel! Oh and I have worked with the homeless! Oh and also I volunteer with food pantries! Oh and also I speak a second language!

I have an advanced liberal arts degree and I work in the arts where I meet all kinds of different people who have different ideas! I love to listen to them! Quite often, I have my mind changed!

God, I am the worst.

—

Here’s a piece I wrote in my excellent writing group this past Tuesday. The prompt was: Make your own list of majors and / or minors. Do you feel disheartened (or better or something else) listing them? The inspiration for the prompt was Anne Carson’s “A Short Talk on Major and Minor.”

Major things:
Sleep, food, sex, connection. The wish inside your heart (whatever it is) and the journey you take to get there. And the decision to take that journey to get to the wish inside your heart -- and not to just settle on the surface.

Minor Things:
Eating, dreams (the soup that goes around in your brain at night --- not the dreams we make for ourselves). Money. Anything that plugs in. 

Major things:
Books, libraries, librarians, mothers of librarians and their mothers as well, and aunties. Cousins, especially when we are young and all forced together to hang out and play penny poker or hide-and-go seek with the people who are family. Also, kids of any age. 

Minor things:
Family, oddly. Especially those folks who don’t get you. Or worse, those who do, but just shake their heads. Many fathers. Lots of husbands. Too many men. The boyfriends who loom large, but who eventually tear you down. Let you down. 

Major Things:
Self. Mountains. Bees. Hiking. Friends who are family. Long walks and the wind before storms. The weather. Metaphors. Poetry and music and art. Love that refuses to hide. Forgiveness. Letting go.