You Wouldn't Believe Who I Met!!!!!
I met Natasha Trethewey!!!! And if you don't know who that is, well, you are not that smart! (It's okay, though. I didn't know who she was, either.) She won the Pulizer Prize for poetry last year! You have got to get her book Native Guard. If you have lost a loved one, you will understand how deeply personal and difficult writing this poetry might have been. The pictures I've seen of her do her no justice--she's drop-dead gorgeous. I've been reinvigorated by her advice and her work.
Going to study now. I have work to do! Google "Natasha Trethewey" and "Monument"--you will understand why she got the prize!
Labels: It Really Happened, My Opinion
Ten Things This Tuesday (NUMBER 350 FOR ME!!!!!!!!)
Ladies and gentlemen (yes, all five of us), I would like to kindly inform you that I have made it through to 350 posts! Yippee!!!!!!
After I get back to school, I'm going to do something educational, and hopefully interesting. At least it is going to be educational and helpful to me and phooey to you if you don't enjoy it. I would tell you that you better like it, dad gum it (family blog, people--no hard core cursing typed here. Heh...)! If you are not interested as I must be for my future as an educated English freak, then uhmmm....like I said, Phooey on you and rasberries in your face, even!
Enough about that. All of you family people have so much stuff to do for the holidays. Well, my unmarried, childless butt has got news for you. Ten things I'm going to do over the holidays and you wish you could do, but you have families and company and guests and children and stuff!
1. Walk around stark nekkid. Yup. I might not even wear houseshoes or footies.
2. Watch "It's a Wonderful Life" 17 times in one day. You know you want to. I can watch it uninterrupted, too!
3. Have take out for Christmas dinner.
4. Sleep late because nobody is waiting for Santa to drop a load before opening presents.
5. Make white hot chocolate with all the nutmeg I want in it. You know you want the recipe. If you ask really nicely, I might tell you.
6. Not make up my bed.
7. Shower and know that there will be hot water.
8. Drink out of my milk jug. No, I don't do that. Well, okay, I do, but only when I'm going to drain it. I swear!
9. Sit down and read a good book while listening to Christmas music. In actuality, I will be studying for my comprehensive exams. No real pleasure in that. If you want to know what my final short list ended up being, ask me, and I'll tell you.
10. Go to the bathroom with the bathroom door open. Yup. I do that sometimes. In the middle of the night. When nobody's around. Just in case someone knocks on the door or something. Okay! Okay! Sometimes I don't close it first thing in the morning either, but that is as far as I'm admitting to!
Labels: My Opinion, Ten Things This Tuesday
Have You Heard This?
"I have impeached myself by resigning." - Richard Nixon
Birth Control Allowed at Maine Middle School
PORTLAND, Me., Oct. 17 — The Portland school board on Wednesday approved a measure allowing middle-school students to gain access to prescription birth control medications without notifying parents.
The proposal, from the Portland Division of Public Health, calls for the independently operated health care center at King Middle School to provide a variety of services to students, including immunizations and physical checkups in addition to birth-control medications and counseling for sexually transmitted diseases, said Lisa Belanger, an administrator for Portland’s student health centers.
All but two members of the 12-person committee voted to approve the plan.
The school principal, Mike McCarthy, said about 5 of the school’s 500 students had identified themselves as being sexually active.
Health care professionals at the clinic advised the committee that the proposal was necessary in order for the clinic to serve students who were engaging in risky behavior.
The conference room at the Wednesday night meeting was packed with parents, students and television cameras as school board committee members discussed the issue and heard testimony from experts and residents.
“It has been shown, over and over again, that this does not increase sexual activity,” said Pat Patterson, the medical director of School-Based Health Centers.
Reaction was mixed.
“This is really a violation of parents’ rights,” Peter Doyle, a Portland resident, told the committee. “If there were a constitutional challenge, you guys would be at risk of a lawsuit.”
Others argued for approval.
“Not every child is getting the guidance needed to keep them safe,” said Richard Veilleux, who said his child attends King Middle School. “This is about giving kids who are sexually active the tools that they need.”
According to the National Assembly on School-Based Health Care, about 30 percent of the 1,700 school-based health centers in the United States provide birth control to students, Dr. Patterson said.
I think they are either taking the easy way out or being outright lazy. I'm concerned about two things. One, why are schools not considering teaching sex education at the school? It ranks up there with giving children condoms. It implies permission. Secondly, have we lost so much faith that children can't be taught the downside of having premature sex?
Labels: Calls for Response, My Opinion
Can't We All Just Pee Along?
I'm a woman. A woman that happens to use public restrooms when necessary. Like tonight. I was at a popular restaurant for several hours. I have this thing where I will go to a place to study because I tend to not do it in my room. I was going to a Japanese place, but it was closed, so I went to the Waffle House. I hate going to this particular Waffle House during the time of day I was going because the people there have no sense of cleanliness. I had a feeling that I was going to actually want something to eat, and I did not want that heffa fixing my food, so I drove around and ended up at this kind of restaurant that serves good versions of basic American food--burgers, steaks, catfish ... stuff like that.
I felt like I could get some coffee in a coffee cup since they have busboys that clean the dishes (as opposed to the servers having to serve and wash dishes like at the Waffle House). After several cups of coffee (and yes, I'm finally getting to the point, but come on ... you know me, I wander sometimes) I needed to go pee. I found the ladies' room which had four stalls. I went into one and, heavens to mergatroid and thank the bathroom gods (because I really had to pee), the toilet seat was not peed on and there was an ample amount of toilet tissue for my back forty and other place (no need for too many details--it is [supposedly] a family blog). I did my business (okay, you don't really want to know how I pee, and if you do, then you need to stop reading my blog, you big freak! Okay, not you Dutch Bitch, but anyone else that is entertaining the thought [okay, Renee, not you either] and I mean stop now ... eewww!) flushed, checked that everything went down the hole, washed my hands, took the paper towel that I dried my hands with, opened the door, and returned to my life at the table.
A few hours--and a few more cups of coffee--later, I returned to the ladies' room. The stall with which I became familiar was available. I opened and the bathroom gods switched off their "on duty" sign, because, though the toilet was flushed and ready for seating, there was no more toilet tissue!
Needless to say, I gasped.
I checked the first stall. I will be polite and simply say that it was unflushed.
Gasp.
I checked the last remaining non-handicapped stall. I will simply say that someone missed their aim and felt it necessary to inform everyone else of their bad target practice.
MENTALLY SCREAMING.
So, can't we just all pee along, ladies? Can we not aim and fire in the hole, and if we cannot, can we take care of cleaning up behind ourselves? I mean if you women can clean up behind your babies, you can at least do it for yourself. I'm not asking for much. I don't need to see your leftover pee on the toilet. I don't. Nobody else does. (And if you do, you need to stop reading my blog, you sick freak!) (Okay, not you, Dutch Bitch. And not you, either, Renee.)
Labels: Calls for Response, Humor, It Really Happened, My Opinion, Screaming, Thoughts
That Low-Down-Dirty Sap-Sucker...
Remember Drew, the liar? Well, he keeps calling me, and I keep answering the phone. I actually deleted it and told myself that he could kiss my @&& from hip to hip and take a little snort from the crack. I just didn't care. He's a liar, and though I can forgive just about anything, I can't get past this. It wouldn't be so bad, but I can talk to him about everything. I've told him things--and I've told people this before--I don't even want to repeat to myself. So--someone shoot off my baby toe--when he called me dead in the middle of the night after he got off work, I answered the phone. Yes, he knew I was sleep; yes, I wanted to go back to sleep, but my dumb back forty stayed and talked to him.
Drew wants me to trust him again.
Not today. Tomorrow's not looking so hot, either.
Labels: It Really Happened, My Opinion, The Negatives
My 250th Post and It's about What?
Liars. This post is about liars.
Why am I awake at this hour? I'm mad. I'm angry. No. Really angry.
So, I have a friend that I've talked to on and off for a few years now. I liked him. I really liked him. He and I had a good "relationship" such as it was. It protected me from acquiring a real life relationship and it also helped me to avoid knowing that any man worth having that saw me would consider having a relationship with me. I'd say, "Nope, I'm kind of in the middle of something," or say to myself, "I don't have to worry about any man trying to have a relationship with me because they don't find me attractive and, anyway, I'm in a 'kind of middle of something' kind of thing."
I'm not making much sense, I know, but consider the time that I made this post. Who would?
I digress.
This friend of mine, I'll call him Drew, just told me something about himself that made me question everything that he said. He told the truth about something he'd been lying about for years--I mean ever since I knew him. I mean we've been friends, we've had emotional ties to each other, we've gone as far as said the "L" word to each other, it's been like that.
This thing that Drew told me, though, has pissed me off. You know how people lie about small things here and there? Well, that's the kind of person he is, but since he and I were so far away from each other, it didn't--heck, it doesn't--matter. I haven't been an angel, either. I've lied to him a few times, but my lies and his lies are like stacking a piece of paper against a tree. (Hey, that's a pretty good one! I'll have to remember that!)
Tonight, he called me about 2:20am and we got into this conversation which--and why was I trying to hold this back for, I don't know--I told him exactly how I felt. I told Drew that I didn't know what made me angrier, his five-year-old lie or that he's been lying for about four years.
The one thing about liars? It hit me like a ton of bricks--liars are empowered when they lie and weaken the people they lie to. They empower themselves by knowing that the truth is something they know, but the lied-to person does not know. It gives them a one-upper, if you will. I feel manipulated and weakened and I am mad as dirt about it.
So right now, I am awake. Awake enough to consider taking a walk in the middle of the night. If it were a little warmer, I would not be posting this. Goodness knows I need to be walking or reading or something besides typing. I know how I will fix this anger-crusted insomnia.
The Merchant of Venice. Good night.
Labels: Calls for Response, My Opinion, The Negatives, Thoughts
Consolation Prizes for My Other Bidders
I just have to honor what I was going to do. I hate neglecting the other bidders:
JCM'S blog and updates Julio Cezar's blog varies between his sidebar that has how much money he's made, his art, his duties as an English teacher--he sounds reluctant about having to do it, and how much the machine is going against the man. It's something he is talking about. Give him a click.
L'undone is a story that Lola is telling. What I've skimmed is interesting, but number 21 in her story is exposing a dirty little deed someone is doing. Support writers. Appreciate, don't hate! Give her a click.
Now, go on. Scoot! click on them! I promise I'll be here when you get back.
Labels: Blog Sites to See, My Opinion
What Is the Problem, Now?
Two things on this blog (there's more, but I'm blocking them to avoid having to plead an insanity case for what I may do if I ride that train of thought) that I'm going to bug you about.
Nah, one at a time. I'll make this one first so it will be second and the next one will be first until the next one which will be after this one and this one will no longer be first.
Catch that? Good. I don't want you trying to read that again.
So my dad calls me. (I'm thinking about making a category called, "Yeah, this one is about my daddy again..." Who knows.) He says nice things to me like, "I love you," "I just want what's best for you," and stuff like that.
I didn't buy it. I knew he was about to say something that made me want to ask him, "What is that supposed to mean, pal?"
He said, "but my heart goes out for you."
What is that supposed to mean, pal?
Okay, you guys, you have read my conversations with my father before, so I ask you. What--oh yeah, I said that twice already, didn't I?
I know one thing. I have to do well here. I have to succeed. Want to know why? Because there are some times that I think about my father. Though I know that there are some men who have lived their whole lives without knowing their children's faces, I should be grateful of knowing my father's name among other things. At the same time, I recall some of the things he has said to me and I wonder. Am I the only person that he talks to like that? Is he seeing my mama when he sees me? Can he not find any redeeming qualities that warrant me to be a little more than mentally incapacitated? Would he even treat me the same way if I were the person that I am when I am away from him? What does he see in me that makes him think that I gave him carte blanche on verbally abusing me the way he does? How can I even remain to have emotional ties to a man who diminishes my spirit whenever he berates me about intangible things?
(Looks like I got my boarding pass and have taken my seat. I might as well continue this train.)
It is my dream to have a dialogue with him that would leave me empowered for a change. It's like Lucy and Charlie Brown. Yup, I went there. Go with me on this. Why does he ever so rarely convince me that he is going to keep the football for me to kick and snatches it whenever I begin to entrust my emotions towards him? Why do people do that? Are some people's souls fed when make others feel as if they are beneath them?
Listen, people. This man is my sole flesh and blood in the universe. There is nobody else who is uniquely connected to me by my parents. So why in the Sam Hill (this is a family blog, you know...) is this happening to me? Am I supposed to be strengthened by it? Is it supposed to build me up? Well, guess what, people. It devastates me.
What's worse? I do love my father and I refuse to give up on him, but I know I will never get the love that I once felt from him ever again. How can my spirit get over something like that? How can I even consider that I can possess pure love--any kind of love--when the first man in my life cannot fulfill me?
Labels: My Opinion, My Writing, The Negatives, Thoughts
I'm Going to Hide
I often wonder if people feel the way I feel. I think that was confirmed last night.
Let me preface this by saying that I have yet to find an on-campus student who is as old as I am. The oldest that I have found is 25.
I had a person--well, more than one person do this, but this one was different--jokingly insult me. The thing is that what she said was right. She told me that nobody got my jokes because I was old. I didn't think that I would have been upset about it. Dare I say, I took it well. This statement was one of those things that stops time, everyone laughs out loud as they, "ooooohh," and congratulate the person who said it.
Sounded like everyone agreed.
I laughed about it, too, after I almost jumped on her. I couldn't laugh as hard given what had been going on with my father. But at this moment, I am hard-pressed to not let it get to me.
In one sense, I know there is this universality of at least okay with one's self. However, I know this--actually, I've known for all of my life--something that is really painful to me.
I'm one of those people who just don't get it. I've always felt as if I were standing outside a building that all of the people around me are standing in. I see myself pulling, pushing, and tugging hard at the door, begging people to let me in, but nobody has a notion to allow me inside.
I remember when I was in the first grade. I had my first "best friend," Lisa. We would play and talk and lots of things. One day, when I got to school, she was playing with three other girls, Pat, Bettina, and Gwen. At the time, she and I were the only black girls in that grade. And she hated me. She was definitely one of the cool ones--people liked her, she was smart, she had long, thick, pretty hair--and I think she might have deemed me as being competition or just unworthy. So she and the other two literally snatched Lisa away from me. LITERALLY. They had one arm and I had the other. I was pulling with all of my might to keep my friend, but they were relentless. Over the years, I've thought that Lisa wanted to go.
I've had things happen to me in my childhood that affected me. Let me just say there are men out there who are really sick. My mom's car accident affected me, also.
I think that if I let anyone around me read this, there would be either pity or dispute, but I know it's true.
Anyway, I'm not rich enough to buy a person to help me change my personality, so I guess that I'll just have to deal with it.
Labels: My Opinion, My Writing, Prose, Thoughts
Pet Peeve Post... GRRRRRR...
So this morning I woke up early and did what had to be done--I went to the bathroom. Living in a dorm situation is interesting at best, but I like the convenience and intimacy of the cube-style dorm living. The entrance opens up to a hallway where the entrances to the dorm rooms are located. There are nine rooms--8 double-occupancy and a single-occupancy--along with the bathroom, but only 12 women occupy the rooms (and you don't want to know how long it took me to figure that out--ick).
I digress. Last night, I met one of the women in the bathroom. She put a sign on the bathroom door that basically told the other women to wash their hands. We chuckled, cringed then moved on with our lives. This morning I see someone's comments added at the bottom:
"God created my hands and they are clean. I do not need to wash them."
I wanted to cry. I wanted to lie out on the cold, bare bathroom floor and cry. Then I wanted to hurl. I wanted to hurl a big, fat, honking rock upside the head of the woman who wrote it. Instead, I washed my hands, went to my room and found a sword of choice: a medium-point Sharpie. (For those of you who don't know, [as if millions of people read what I write--yeesh] a Sharpie is a permanent ink felt-tip marker.) I turned to the sign behind the bathroom door and wrote:
"And the devil is out there. WASH YOUR HANDS!"
I'll report on this as developments happen. In fact, I wrote an op/ed on it that I may submit to the school paper. I may put it here.
Labels: My Opinion, Prose, Thoughts
His Day My Way
On this holiday one year ago, I submitted an op/ed piece that I'd like to share with you today. Itgot posted in my local city paper as well as in a newspaper in a large city. I'm thrilled to have read it again. I almost cannot believe these are my words, so you know that means I feel like I was led to write them. I hope you enjoy them as well.
What are your plans for today? I am delighted that the college I attend will be closed for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. It will give me a chance to prepare for my first classes after explaining policies and syllabi.
In the past, on the third Monday of January, i have done things that my ancestors of yesteryear were not able to do: walked in the front door of many otherwise racially exclusive restaurants and stores or rode in the front half of city transportation. It was my secret way of honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the era that allows me these now-normal actions.
I'd make sure that I wore my favorite t-shirt that displays Martin Luther King, Jr. and a quote:
"Violence as a way of acheiving racial justice is both impractical and immoral. It is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction for all. The old law of an eye for an eye leaves everyone blind. it is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding; it seeks to annihilate rather than convert. Violence is immoral because it thrives on hatred rather than love. It destroys community and makes brotherhood impossible. It leaves society in monologue rather than dialogue. Violence ends by defeating tiself. It creates bitterness in the survivors and brutaility in the destroyers."
In a time where violence is used to express insignificant rationality as fervently as powerful causes, this quote is more exigent than when it was initially expressed.
I implore readers to take a few minutes andreflect how their lives would be different if a lady had decided to move to the back of the bus.
I implore everyone to consider how enriched we would all be without James Meredith's bravery and determination to become educated at the University of Mississippi.
I implore everyone to ask themselves if how they think about human equality is regressive or progressive.
I implore everyone to release the mental binds that restrict their humanity.
Finally, each of us should consider this holiday as an Independence Day in January.
I ask all who chose to honor this day to please do so with reverence. I know I will. I'll be the one in the black t-shirt.
Labels: Feel Goods, My Blog, My Opinion, My Writing, Thoughts
If at First You Don't Succeed, Speak, Speak Again
Something's been crossing my mind over the last couple of days. The school campus had a focus on what is liberal and what is conservative. Between that and my having to write an ethics paper (I chose to write against Save Haven Laws), I began to believe that the difference between being liberal and being conservative also may lie on who we push off our opinions.
Yeah, yeah, I know. I really have to work on that. Don't beat me up about it. It's not about me.
You see, I've always been murky about what's conservative and what's liberal. I'm not a political head; I've always voted democratically not necessarily blindly, but always with the notion that deep down inside, I did not want to vote republican. That said, I considered the abortion laws.
Come on, y'all! You know I love you! Just hear me out before you groan and moan.
Thanks.
Maybe I shouldn't say this, but for those who wish to have abortion laws abolished, there is the argument that if a woman did not want the baby, but had to keep it because abortion became illegal, who would keep the unwanted baby? I can't keep it, can any of the right-to-lifers? I'm just wondering if those same people who are picketing could not use their time more wisely by promoting safe sex and abstinence or providing programs that would let well-qualified people (you know what I mean, gone through the rigamarole to adopt a kid) be able to let women bring children to term and take them instead of aborting them.
Is what I may believe strengthened when I can justify it or when others agree with me? Am I that much vehement about my opinion when I can impose my beliefs based on my life onto other people? Does that make me more liberal or more conservative? Does others accepting my opinion make me more liberal or conservative?
Labels: My Opinion, My Writing
The Hours
So, lately I’ve be cognizant of every hour that passes by. I’m not sure if it is because of the number of hours I actually study or if I will soon have to say I am forty-something. I yearn to stretch the period when I can still say I’m forty. When I first turned forty at the beginning of the year, I told people that I didn’t think of it as forty; I thought of it as “twenty-twenty.” It worked for me. And, dad gum it, it still does!
So an hour has transitioned since I’ve written this. I should have been working on my Spanish homework. Now I will be working on my Spanish homework instead of getting dressed for breakfast.
That hour will never return. I see it slip away from me like a fond memory.
Labels: My Opinion, My Writing
English Wasn't America's Language?
-----
Confucius
Well this may be one of only a handful of blogs that doesn't talk about that singing contest. You can thank me in comments.
Until May 18, 2006, English had not been established as the official national language. What’s the big freaking deal anyway?
Frankly, I’m thinking this was just a faux pas. Nobody thought to make English the language of choice. I did a smidgen of research and found that the purpose of doing this is not necessarily related to stopping people from
Oh, yeah. I know it sounds like a flaky excuse. That’s what I read though, and I’m going to go with it. I mean what else is there to do? English is supposed to be the language of most of us. A few American territories two states have more than one official language. I’ll give you a moment to figure out what they could possibly be.
In the 2000 census, Hispanics and Oriental people are the two largest minorities who have their own languages. These two minorities make up about 17%. On the other side of the coin, the
Making English the official national language is like putting a sign on a prostitute. She’s standing on the corner, dressed up in a provocative manner, cars are pulling up to talk to her for a few minutes, she gets in, in a few minutes later she gets back on the corner for the whole thing to happen again. The signs that she is a prostitute are clear. Putting a sign on her just adds the stamp of confirmation.
So, it’s no big deal. This gesture of the government will change nothing. Dare I say that we should be more open to learning and teaching other languages. We are the melting pot. We should be taught other cultures and other languages. No need to worry about
Those places that have bilingual official languages in the
Ooh! I felt dendrites grow. How about you? Don't you feel a little edumacated? I does!
Labels: My Opinion, My Writing, Prose
It's not about us
I said it’s not about us. Well, most of the time it won’t be about us. It may very well be about one of us. My name is not gina, but that’s the name I like when a man comes up to me and ask, “What’s your name?” So, call me gina.
Here’s a little about myself. My purpose for doing this is to strengthen my writing chops.I am not married and have no children. I’d like to call my age “twenty-twenty” instead of forty. I spent a great deal of my life roaming aimlessly. A life changing event that you will hear about another time changed me from being a hat rack to finding a focus; a purpose, if you will. So in the last year, I’ve gone back to school, completed an Associate’s degree, won some contests in poetry and drama, written some op-eds and a letter to the editor that I’m darn impressed with.
Frankly, I didn’t know I had this in me. You will see some random trains of thought along with my poetry and some formally written stories and opinions.
Well, here’s to my doing the dayang thang. Cheers!
Labels: My Opinion, My Writing