Conducting the Birds

2008-08-16T19:24:00.003-06:00

'Cosmopolitan' Institute Completes Decades-Long Study On How To Please Your Man

I still, still heart The Onion.

2008-08-02T18:16:00.002-06:00

2008-07-11T11:31:00.003-06:00

There is a lot of construction going on in Edmonton. So much construction that it is wise when planning a trip, even if that trip is just to the grocery store, to anticipate it will take you at least twice as long as it usually would. I don't mind construction. I mean, it stinks, but it's summer, we all saw it coming, I get the necessity and I wouldn't begrudge the workers or city planner or whoever if it weren't so incredibly badly managed. If you are shutting down an entire street/a major highway exit, it would be wise to post signs alerting people to this reality before it is too late for them to plan another route such that, at rush hour, hundreds of cars end up bottle-necking into dead ends that they then have to figure a way out of. It's just stupid. It doesn't take much planning or forethought to put a sign up saying "_____ exit/street closed." Seriously.

Also, why is it that the only women I see on these construction sites are the ones holding the "Slow/Stop" signs? I find this annoying. I don't really know anything about the construction industry, so I won't make any sweeping judgments. If there's some explanation for this (i.e. women are specifically applying for the position of sign holder rather than being dumped in that job) please let me know. Cause I find it disheartening that "women in the trades," in this case, means women standing at the side of the road all day holding signs. The situation irks me. I am irked.

2008-07-06T22:11:00.002-06:00

Come on skinny love just last the year...

Today I passed a church marquee that read “It is desirable to seek purity.” I wondered what their definition of desire might be and then imagined the defeated pastor who chose such an unimaginative message.

I’m home again, mostly. I think my cat is depressed. I’m mostly discontented. Not quite depressed, just generally uneasy and restless. I just signed another 6 month lease and am instantly panicked about the decision, struck by an intense need to move away from here now that I cannot.

Yesterday a friend and I commiserated over the various forms of ickiness and psychic unrest brought to the fore by thesis-writing.

L: I keep dreaming of having babies. I’m always pregnant.
D: Yeah, while I was writing mine I was constantly having broken condom dreams.

Uncontrollable reproduction! AH!

Weird Muslim rule of the day: apparently it is forbidden for women to use tampons because their use resembles masturbation. I take this as further evidence that these rulings were all written by men. Men who are apparently terrible lovers with a serious misunderstanding of the mechanics of female masturbation.

I think everyone should go download some Girl Talk. He’s awesome. He now provides the musical background for all of my thesis writing dance breaks.

The sunset out my window is unusually purple. Purple and magenta. God is embracing his inner five-year-old girl tonight.

2008-07-04T19:44:00.002-06:00

A week ago I received an email from one of my new muslim "brothers" (it feels odd calling these strangers with whom I have very little/almost nothing in common my brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles etc… strange and contrived and disingenuous). He was hoping I would be willing to be interviewed for a documentary he is putting together in an attempt to unread some of the unflattering interpretations of ayahs derived from out of context, poor readings. I was wary. A) I'm not all that familiar with the Qur'an, certainly not someone to ask re appropriate interpretations etc. B) I couldn't help but feel the sneaking suspicion that the reason my participation was so sought after was not so much because I might have useful things to say (that seemed doubtful) but because I possess dirty blonde locks and pasty white skin. "Look, look! The white girl doesn't think we're terrorists! She thinks Muslims are so awesome she even decided to become one! If the white girl's a muslim, how bad can they be? Did we mention she's white!?? See how "normal" she looks!? See? Muslims are just like you!"

But the guy doing the documentary is so far one of the few muslims with whom I can have a conversation and I figured I should probably not alienate any more of the community. Also, having had a few good conversations with him, it did occur to me that perhaps he might actually think I have something interesting or useful to say, and so I agreed to help out.

I really do like him and I think the project could be interesting and good, but the interview was mostly not. Questions like "When you hear people suggest that all Muslims are terrorists, what do you think? How does that make you feel," seem mostly useless to me. Answer: "It makes me angry and sad?" Seriously. What do you want from me?

A piece like this tends toward broad strokes and massive generalizations. And I understand that "the other side" is painting in broad strokes too, and so what is the alternative but to present an equally distorted, unrealistically rosey image of Edmonton Muslims? but I really didn't want to participate in that.

Sadly, I think I did. I quickly heard myself saying things like "Muslims are caring, friendly people. Get to know some." And feeling my self-respect dwindle. “They're just like you and I"/"make a token muslim friend!" Ultimately, none of the folk who think all Muslims are terrorists are going to see this production, and the overly positive assimilationist picture it portrays to everyone else just upholds the (I think) overriding sense among non-muslims that muslims are kinda different and that's okay as long as they walk, talk and act like the rest of us in public.

I think the real value and perhaps challenge in a project like this is to attempt to capture the nuanced character of the Muslim community, a community struggling with the challenge of maintaining a distinct, minority orientation towards the world within an incredibly different, often opposing, social frame. What sort of community does that create and why? I have seen and heard lots of perspectives on this, some offensive, most defensive, some insightful and nuanced negotiations. I have certainly met Muslims who seem "just like us" and Muslims who seem scary and extreme and Muslims who are clearly attempting to straddle the fence. All the Muslims I meet are very nice to me, very eager to help me out in any way they can, and that's great, as long as I accept their help, which generally comes in the form of instructions on how to dress, act, talk, be, look, feel, relate to God, and keep all my problems to myself. Ultimately, I've come to know an extremely insular community with a lot of unaddressed internal issues, a shitload of denial, but, also, enough good intentions, well wishes and helpful sentiments to eliminate world hunger through sheer will... and if stuff worked like that, it’d be a great community to be part of (and we would have ended world hunger!) But stuff doesn’t work like that. Fortifying borders and refusing to address problems simply because you don’t think they /should be/ Muslim problems is just stupid. There is a gaping canyon of difference between saying Muslims should strive to live in particular ways and saying Muslims always do live in these ways, moreover, they do so easily, without struggle or failure, because “western problems” do not affect Muslims. They do. Get over the shock and deal with it realistically and maturely.

Anyway, the point: “Muslims are friendly and awesome and caring and you should get to know some,” is maybe not the most useful or accurate message to be sending anyone, Muslim or non-Muslim.

So when I was asked "What do you think or feel when you hear people say that Muslims are extremists or Muslims oppress women" what I really wanted to say was that the good liberal impulses that once would have allowed me a very simple defensive reaction, negating the statement, are now gone. Now that I know Muslims, now that I’ve shed the naïve and patronizing liberal sentiments the documentary is meant to instill, I'm no longer comfortable saying that's wrong, absurd, unfounded, ignorant. The motivation for the statements is mostly wrong and ignorant, but I'm not going to blindly and generally insist Muslims aren't extreme, aren't oppressive to women. I have found this community very oppressive, as a woman and as a /person/. I have found it offensive. I have found uncritical homophobia, misogyny, essentialisms, frightening pro-life sentiments, and compassion, love and mercy only for those who stay strictly within the lines, within the rules.

In Islam, in the Qur'an, in the sirrahs, I have found a hope and a God and a way that makes sense. Not in the community. I think I mostly respectfully retire from the community.

2008-07-01T20:32:00.002-06:00

hm... the embed doesn't seem to want to work. Let's try the link.

You should probably watch all of them. Sarah Haskins is great!

2008-06-30T10:28:00.006-06:00

Yesterday I fled my tiny apartment-come-oven in search of asylum from the heat. I landed at the mercifully air-conditioned family homestead.

Now significantly less smelly, sweaty and overheated, I am back to work. 5 pages today. I will crack 25. Yes I will. To help in this effort, my siblings have provided a motivational wardrobe. Chris lent me his samurai t-shirt. It pictures a shadowy ninja, sword drawn, ready for battle and the word "Samurai" scrolled large at the bottom. Apparently he wears this whenever he feels the pressure of deadlines. He says it lends confidence.

Julia saw my samurai and suggested that tomorrow I try her version of this motivational technique. She proceeded to produce a t-shirt that reads "GI Joe: A Real American Hero"--the western version of persona-adopting as strategy for essay completion. I find it amusing that both my siblings consider this standard practice. Whatever works...

Also today my advisor relayed the tale of the children's book he once assigned as reading for his class on theorizing the subject:

"Did I ever tell you that one year I assigned a children's book for 333 entitled, The Little Mole Who Knew It Was None of His Business, in which a happy German mole pops his head out of his hole one sunny morning, only to have it pooped on. The rest of the book is about his obsessive search for who did it and how he got his revenge."

I promptly inquired as to the nature of this revenge. He replied:

"The culprit turned out to be a dog who was much larger. The mole climbed on the dog's head and defecated there, but because of the size difference, it was like a pea bouncing off the dog's nose and it was utterly indifferent, but the mole, convinced that he had won a great victory, returned delighted and deluded to his hole."

He also sent me these pictures:

I laughed so hard I had to run to the bathroom so as not to pee myself. I'm a bit confused as to why the mole hasn't removed the coil of shit from his head. I'm pretty sure that if someone were to poo on my head, that would be my first order of business.

2008-06-26T14:35:00.003-06:00

Oh hilarious...

Yesterday I got an email from my good friend Ian. Ian recently completed a thesis and is now wasting time before he departs for Europe. Apparently yesterday his newfound time-wasting task led him to eHarmony.com where he proceeded to fill out their personality profile survey to see what the world of internet dating might have to say about his romantic prospects.

For those of you who know Ian, you're probably already laughing. For everyone else, I will say that Ian, though I love him dearly, is... abrasive. Pessimistic, dark and depressive to the point of near-absurdity and often intentional cruelty, he is the sort of person for whom insanity is ever-waiting just around the corner. If asked to sum up his personality I would say something like sociopathy meets suicidal ideation.

So it is not really a surprise that, upon completing the survey, eHarmony presented him with the following message:

"eHarmony is based upon a complex matching system developed through extensive research with married couples. One of the requirements for successful matching is that participants fall within certain defined profiles. If we find that we will not be able to match a user using these profiles, we feel it is only fair to inform them early in the process.

We are so convinced of the importance of creating compatible matches to help people establish happy, lasting relationships that we sometimes choose not to provide service rather than risk an uncertain match.

Unfortunately, we are not able to make our profiles work for you. Our matching model could not accurately predict with whom you would be best matched. This occurs for about 20% of potential users, so 1 in 5 people simply will not benefit from our service. We hope that you understand, and we regret our inability to provide service for you at this time."

He forwarded the message to me and suggested I take a crack at the survey myself. So I did. My result:

"eHarmony is based upon a complex matching system developed through extensive research with married couples. One of the requirements for successful matching is that participants fall within certain defined profiles. If we find that we will not be able to match a user using these profiles, we feel it is only fair to inform them early in the process.

We are so convinced of the importance of creating compatible matches to help people establish happy, lasting relationships that we sometimes choose not to provide service rather than risk an uncertain match.

Unfortunately, we are not able to make our profiles work for you. Our matching model could not accurately predict with whom you would be best matched. This occurs for about 20% of potential users, so 1 in 5 people simply will not benefit from our service. We hope that you understand, and we regret our inability to provide service for you at this time."

Ouch. "We regret to inform you that a complex matching system has determined that you will die alone. Unfortunately you are so unloveable we don't think it would be ethical to subject even sad, internet daters to you. Enjoy your hermetic existence."

Awesome!

UPDATE: Sarah gets to be happy, but apparently only with Chinese men. The front runners so far are Richard, who says the first thing Sarah will notice about him is that he's tall, dark, handsome, and has the ability to make people feel good about themselves. She might date Ryan out of pity. He's looking for someone who looks forward to seeing him... standards so very, very low. But then, the last book Ryan read and enjoyed:

"It was a book about the lives of bodybuiders. I liked that it showed that even though alot of them are on PED's it takes a total commitment to the goal to be successful and even though their sacrifices may not lead to success they continue in pursuit of their goals."

"Even though they are on drugs, they can still try really hard and not accomplish things they want to."

2008-06-24T15:59:00.002-06:00

I would like to suggest that this is the least depressing Elliott Smith song. It's actually kinda happy. Must have been an off day for him. But it's one of my favourites:

London bridge is safe and sound
no matter what you keep repeating.
nothing's gonna drag me down
to a death that's not worth cheating.

for someone half as smart you'd be a work of art.
you put yourself apart.
I can't help you until you start.

It's maybe a little mean, but by Elliott's standards, this is joyous.

2008-06-23T22:35:00.004-06:00

Sarah got back Friday night and since then we have settled right back into our usual routine, seeing each other almost daily, which means that life is good again! Also, tonight Sarah convinced me to be her date at the Sterlings and so we both got to dress up all fancy, but actually ended up in matching dresses, both belonging to me since she lacked time to obtain one of her very own. AND it was, I think, the first time in years that the gang of us were back together. Witness, Lauren, Sus, Laura and Sarah, together again!

Unfortunately, fancy dress + heels = Laura with sore feet and a stomach ache. I'm not sure how I'm justifying blaming the stomach ache on either the heels or the dress, but I'm sure they were behind it somehow. And so off to bed. Night all!

2008-06-23T14:38:00.003-06:00

I watched Angels in America again yesterday. There’s a lot to be said about that film, and most of it probably shouldn’t be said by me, but I also love it so much that I think I have to take a stab. And so...

Basically: The movie follows a group of New Yorkers in the mid-eighties, living in various relations to and with AIDs. Prior Walters is our dying, unlikely and reluctant prophet, who is, at the outset of the film, abandoned by his lover, Louis. Miserable and alone, Prior begins to hear voices and have visions, culminating in the finale of Part One, as an Angel crashes through the roof of his apartment to deliver the book and the message: stop moving. Human movement, progress, change, shakes heaven, causing earthquakes, “shaking Him.” Says the Angel to her prophet: “Quake follows Quake, absence follows absence […] then… He left… and did not return. […] You have driven Him away. You must stop moving”

Prior refuses this message. “I want you to go away. I am tired to death of being done to, walked out on, infected, fucked over and now tortured by some mixed up irresponsible angel.”

Replies the Angel:

“You can’t outrun your Occupation, Jonah.
Hiding from Me one place, you will find me in another.
I I I I stop down the road, waiting for you.
You know me, prophet: Your battered heart, Bleeding Life in the Universe of Wounds”

So biblical references are pretty blatant, self-confessed, throughout the film (I suggest you dust off your Children’s Bible before renting). Enter Jonah. For all you heathens, Jonah was a reluctant prophet, who fled the call of God only to be swallowed by a whale and released through God’s mercy upon repenting. (Though I’m pretty sure I’d apologized too if faced with a life-sentence in the belly of a whale.)

Anyway, Prior isn’t down with the whole prophesying gig, though, admittedly, Kushner is a bit more lenient than God, leaving out the giant man-eating fish. For Prior, the request for stasis is equated with a request for death. “Stop moving? That’s what you want? Answer me! You want me dead.” The angel demands submission to mortality, surrender and acceptance of death, and Prior will not relent.

The refusal to surrender life is pretty prominent throughout the film. (Not a surprise in a film most obviously about AIDs). We run into it again with the Angel’s second visit, except now Jonah is replaced by Jacob. The (relevant) lowdown on Jacob: Isaac is Jacob and Esau’s Dad. Isaac is dying and so he decides he’s gonna bless Esau before he dies. Jacob is, it seems, a crappy brother (and, as Roy Cohn's chracter says, "a ruthless motherfucker"), so he disguises himself and steals Esau’s blessing. Esau is understandably pissed and swears to kill Jacob once Isaac dies.

So Jacob’s on the run, with a seriously badass brother out to get him. He figures he’s pretty screwed without backup, so he settles in for a night of communion with God. Then it gets a bit confusing, cause instead an angel shows up--or sometimes it’s just a man, it gets called a messenger, or maybe it’s God himself, not totally clear on this. Regardless, a badass man vs. heavenly being wrestling match ensues. The match goes to the underdog; Jacob wins, incurring only an injury in his left thigh, and then demands a blessing from the angel, which has been interpretted as Jacob demanding life, that he not die at the hands of his brother (of note, Prior walks with a limp in his left leg throughout the film.)

So... when the angel appears for the second time, Prior is with his ex-lover’s, new lover’s mormon mother (about which Prior comments “I wish you would be more true to your demographic profile. Life is confusing enough.”), who advises him on scriptural precedent, suggesting that he demand a blessing from the angel. Prior takes the advice, grabs hold of the Angel and refuses to let go, screaming “I will not let thee go except thou bless me. Take back your book!” Eventually the angel relents when Prior injures her (she states that she has pulled a thigh muscle). A ladder of fire descends from the sky and Prior is instructed to ascend to heaven to return the book. Before a committee of angels, he proclaims “we can’t just stop.” The angels urge him to remain in heaven, but he insists upon his blessing:

“But still. Still. Bless me anyway. I want more life. I can’t help myself. I do. I have lived through such terrible times and there are people who have lived through much, much worse, but you see them living anyway. When they are more spirit than body, more sores than skin. When they are burned and in agony, when flies lay eggs in the corner of the eyes of their children, they live. Death usually has to take life away. I don’t know if that’s just the animal; I don’t know if it’s not braver to die, but I recognize the habit, the addiction to being alive. We live past hope; if I can find hope anywhere, that’s it; that’s the best I can do. It’s so much not enough. It’s so inadequate. But still. Bless me anyway. I want more life. And if He returns, take Him to court. He walked out on us. He ought to pay.”

The monologue is awesome. The whole scene is awesome. But, ultimately, Prior refuses the call of religion... or maybe God himself: solace in what comes after, the promise of better things to come. He clings to life instead, no matter how despicable, messy, unbearable. Life instead. And so also a value in life itself, on its own, divorced from a hereafter. I was reminded of a line that struck me from one of my favourite TV shows as I was rewatching /that/ recently.

Cameron: You find it more comforting to believe this is it?
House: I find it more comforting to believe this isn’t simply a test.

Life as something more than an inventory of actions that fall into either a heaven or a hell category, actions judged solely based on their utility in earning one entrance into heaven. Life can’t be reduced to that, or maybe can, but shouldn’t. Does that belief require rejection of the very notion of an afterlife as religiously conceived? Does it boil down to a choice: life or life after life?

... and now I’m off-track. Back to Jacob. He’s littered throughout, with the other blatant reference coming from Joe, the closeted, gay, Mormon, Republican lawyer. Joe is attempting to explain his struggles to repress his homosexual desires to his wife:

“I had a book of Bible stories when I was a kid. There was a picture I’d look at twenty times every day: Jacob wrestles with the Angel. I don’t really remember the story, or why the wrestling—just the picture. Jacob is young and very strong. The angel is…a beautiful man, with golden hair and wings, of course. I still dream about it. Many nights. I’m…It’s me. In that struggle. Fierce and unfair. The angel is not human, and it holds nothing back, so how could anyone human win, what kind of fight is that? It’s not just. Losing means your soul thrown down in the dust, your heart torn out from God’s. But you can’t not lose.”

The picture:

Here it’s Joe’s turn to do battle with the Divine. But, while Prior seems to win by rejecting God altogether, Joe-as-Jacob points to the inevitability of defeat. He eventually surrenders to the angel, embraces his homosexual desire and becomes Louis’s lover. In both cases, angels do not stand in for God, rather they symbolize the very absence of God. For Prior, the angel appears because God has abandoned Us, Them. Embracing the angel, for Joe, means embracing a life of sin, forsaking God. Kushner offers his characters opportunities to refuse submission to God, the Law, the Father, or at least to refuse the uncomplicated ease of such a gesture. Further he troubles the hierarchy of Heaven and earth; Heaven is not ordered paradise, but is in disarray just as is earth. Angels are dragged down to earth, people climb to heaven and back.

The troubling of binaries doesn’t end with heaven and hell, though it is most always linked thereto. Kushner is committed to destabilizing categories throughout, demonstrated most obviously in the instruction that actors must play multiple characters. Identities are not stable. Neither is sexuality. Even Prior, the gay protagonist has his orientation troubled. During the first visitation, Prior and the angel (who, though described as hermaphroditic, is manifestly a woman, a gorgeous Emma Thompson to be exact) have sex, what seems a fairly anomalous moment, inserted expressively for the purpose of denying Prior an absolute or essential sexuality. Ultimately, Kushner punctures the entire script with troubling juxtapositions of love/hate, sickness/health, pain/pleasure, heaven/earth, heterosexual/homosexual, progress/regression, movement/stasis, past/future, life/death in what seems an attempt to explode them all and ultimately rebuild, hence the title of Part II: Perestroika. I don’t know if he gets there. I want to say that Kushner, rather than actually destabilizing binaries, actually inverts the hierarchies, favouring liberal progress over all else. Example: the only straightforwardly heterosexual character in the film is Harper, a delusional Valium addict who ultimately leaves New York, not making it to the rosey finish.

The refusal to regress (hence the incitement to progress, forward motion) shows up again in Prior and Louis’s relationship, but this time tied to notions of forgiveness and redemption. When Louis leaves Prior, Prior denies Louis claim to love:

Louis: You can love someone and fail them. You can love them and not be able to…
Prior: You can theoretically, yes. A person can. Maybe an editorial you can love, Louis. But not you. Specifically you, I don’t know, I think you are excluded from that general category. A Person could theoretically love and maybe many do, but we know now that you can’t.
Louis: I love you
Prior: I repeat: who cares? We have reached a verdict your honour, this mans’ heart is deficient. He loves, but his love is worth nothing.

And later:

Prior: When you cry you endanger nothing in yourself. It’s like the idea of crying when you do it. The idea of love.

Love, for Prior, is something to be proven, born out in actions. Love is a verb.
Louis’s abandonment effaces the possibility that he loves, for Prior. Love would not allow the act, or more precisely, the act cannot be love and so the love cannot be said to exist.

By the end of the play, Louis returns, physically battered as Prior requested, and declares that he wants to come back.

Louis: I really failed you… (crying) This is hard… Failing in love isn’t the same as not loving. It doesn’t let you off the hook; it doesn’t mean you’re free to not love.

(Louis crawls into bed next to Prior.)

Prior: I love you Louis. I really do. But you can’t come back. Not ever. I’m sorry but you can’t.

Prior accepts, finally, that to love someone and yet damage them irreparably is possible (is perhaps the very nature of love), but just as love does not let Louis off the hook, neither does Prior. Forgiveness is perhaps possible here, but going back is not. Damage done can be forgiven, maybe, but not erased and the prices that attach hold regardless. There is finally no redemption.

...and there's so much more to say, but I should really go write my thesis instead. Stay tuned for more stupidly long posts designed to allow me to escape guilt re not writing thesis by continuing to write, just not about that. Also, everyone go watch this and then leave comments, or come find me and talk to me about it. That would also provide an excusable distraction from the task at hand.

Oh, and the final scene. Enjoy!

2008-06-16T16:58:00.004-06:00

A random array of links...

Read the comments... Now imagine me huddled before my computer screen thinking alternately "Good God; what have I done?" and "I'm going to be single forever."

And, oh dear. Not Angelina Ballerina.

This is just cool. Bodies are awesome. Especially ovaries.

And broadsheet's take on the Sex and the City craze.

And then there's this, which (thank goodness) reminded me that in the midst of worrying about mastering the prayer thing, reading sirahs and scripture, giving up alcohol and pork, and kicking my pesky coke habit, I completely forgot to book my hymenoplasty and obtain my certificate of virginity. Silly me. Sucks to be used goods. Or maybe it just sucks to be muslim? Tonight I'm not sure, but I'm tired and sick of being disappointed and angry and frustrated. sigh.

Also, I recently watched The Laramie Project again. It is good. Go see it if you have not already. I usually cry a few times during this movie, but this time I held my own through the entire thing until the point where Clea DuVall speaks to the local preacher who comments, "I only hope that Matthew Shepard, while he was tied to that fence, had time to reflect on a moment when somebody had spoken the word of the Lord to him, and that before he slipped into a coma, he had a chance to reflect on his lifestyle." Duvall's character looks stunned, thanks him for speaking to her. The film cuts to her leaving the restaurant with Nestor Carbonell (playing Moises Kaufman). She says "I let him say that to me. I let him say that and I didn't say anything back."

I cried then. I guess I know where I am.

Also, I'm going to a thing at the end of the month that requires fancy dress. I mentioned this to the family a while back, and last week I was presented with a new dress via Dad. This weekend Mom supplemented the outfit with fancy strappy heels. Girls' clothes! The idea arouses a mixture of ick! and wee! Honestly, I'm excited. I feel like I felt when I used to break into my Mom's closet as a kindergartner to play dress-up. It will be a night to play the part of the woman who wears the little black dress and the high heels and does her hair and sports lots of makeup. The trickery is thrilling: I might get caught wearing someone else's clothes; but if I am not found out, I will get to leave myself behind for a night. I'm reminded that it still sure is fun to play dress-up.

And also, I need to stop starting paragraphs with also or and.

2008-06-14T22:23:00.004-06:00

Someone pointed out to me a while back that I have a large bump on the top of both my feet. It’s a bone that juts out between my big toe and my ankle. I had assumed everyone has this bump, that perhaps mine is a bit more pronounced, but that this is a common feature of all feet.

I began a survey. I have been checking the feet of all those I know well enough to see barefoot for some time now. The onset of summer has allowed me to expand my sample size significantly, and it turns out that my friend was right; this bump appears to be an anomaly particular to only my feet.

My mother is in town this weekend. My mother and I used to be very close; we were, as it turns out, close to the point that psychiatrists and psychologists would later tell me that our special bond was symptomatic of an inappropriate parent-child role reversal. After much therapy and significant practice in boundary-setting, my mother and I are no longer so very close. It’s good, healthy and necessary distance, but it wasn’t and couldn’t be achieved without substantial wounds on both sides. There is hurt now that doesn’t disappear easily and a wariness from both of us; we are careful not to come too close for fear of further injury. The disconnect feels blunt, as though I have emptied myself of her. She is foreign now, a stranger or a visitor.

This afternoon we found ourselves sitting side by side on the couch with our feet on the coffee table.

“You have the same bump as I have,” she said.

My mother’s feet are two sizes larger than mine and while her big toe clearly stands out as the largest, my second toe outreaches my big toe by a full nail’s length. But exactly halfway between the end of her big toe and the beginning of the curve of her ankle there is a noticeable protrusion. My mother has the identical set of bone-bumps on each of her feet. None of my siblings have them. Just her and I. A tangible, material connection, marking our bodies. Distance and boundaries and therapy and miles and innumerable battles aside, I’m from her or of her or bits of her or a rearranged version of her, a her she might have been. The proof is in our feet.

2008-06-08T15:41:00.004-06:00

Hmmm...

I appreciate the sentiment; I get what they're trying to do; I have a limited amount of sympathy for the "love your body just the way it is" movement when it is framed in the context of a beauty industry that problematically represents ideal womanhood. But part of the problem with that industry is that it reduces women to sex objects and suggests that women are of value primarily because we wear bikinis, and so all women should wear bikinis and should want to wear bikinis. The next step is to say we should all look a certain way in them, but the first step seems to me to be enforcing bikinis as appropriate beach wear to begin with.

I have been privy to the pressure to wear revealing bathing suits; how else does one get noticed at a pool/beach? (And the point, of course, is to get noticed; enjoying your swim is a secondary concern.) Mostly I feel ridiculous and naked in bikinis and don't much like wearing them. Swimming comfortably, for me, does not require a bikini mind because I would rather wear my one piece and swim shorts and not have to worry about strangers seeing my stretch marks or admiring my flat stomach, noting my love handles or ogling my breasts.

It's a fine line and a contentious issue, and I get that some women want to wear, and feel comfortable wearing, bikinis and that is a-okay with me. But I'm not sure that, if a woman is hesitant about trouncing around in the equivalent of her underwear in front of total strangers, our first response should be to assume she needs to adjust her thinking, push through the doubt and discomfort and wear that bitty number. I think labeling this a feminist move is problematic, and labeling it a liberatory move, even more problematic. Maybe it's okay not to want to wear a bikini. Maybe it's okay not to feel comfortable wearing a bikini. Maybe, just maybe, it's even okay if you don't feel comfortable wearing a bikini because you think you look bad, fat or otherwise unappealing in it. Honestly, you're probably right; not many people look awesome with tiny pieces of spandex strapped across their naughty bits. It's not pathological; it's realistic.

But I suppose women of all shapes and sizes should have the right to feel comfortable enough with their bodies to be ogled at the beach. Yeah, that sounds about right.

2008-06-05T14:47:00.002-06:00

Scroll down...
I'm sure there must be intelligent things that could be said about this, but I'm busy being confused. Just... why?

2008-06-05T14:29:00.002-06:00

I bought a new phone a few days ago. Today it occurred to me that, while no lights were flashing in an attempt to tell me I have messages, it is possible that this phone doesn't have a message indicator light in which case I should probably check for messages anyway. So I did. And the scary robotic woman informed me that I had 22 expired messages and 3 new messages. I don't know what my phone/answering service has been up to, but I just listened to messages dating back to the middle of May. I promise I have been checking my messages regularly. The lady told me I had no new messages. I thought I had become wildly unpopular, but, as it turns out, I am instead accidentally terribly rude.

Anyway, if you've called me in the past month and not received a call back, I promise I am not avoiding you. I probably love you dearly and value our friendship/acquaintance/professional relationship greatly (with the exception of the guy who wanted to sell me a home security system and the people who wanted to inform me of an exciting opportunity to lower my interest rates.) I would have called you back had I received the message. In fact, call me right now. I'll go out, and you can leave messages and, just wait, you'll see, I'll call you right back.

2008-06-04T19:53:00.003-06:00

I am soaking wet. sopping. drenched. to the point that whole beads of water are running down my chest underneath my sweatshirt. I hope everyone in Edmonton took full advantage of the particularly impressive thunderstorm that just went down. For those who are out of town, I pray weather currents blow the storm clouds in your direction (although, due to my limited knowledge of meteorology, I'm not entirely sure that's even possible.)

There are things to be said about thunderstorms, rain. The feeling of water seeping through fabric, touching skin, trickling along grooves between goosebumps formed by the combination of the chill and the roar of thunder, creating eddies. Drips tracing paths, tiny tickles, creeping across tummies, pooling in bellybuttons, overflowing downward. There are things to be said.

2008-06-02T19:01:00.002-06:00

This also made me laugh lots. It's written across the butt too. To quote one of the comments: "Because nothing says "I plan not to have sex until marriage" like plastering text across your ass."

I wonder if they've made a similar boys' version. Something tells me no.

2008-06-02T17:23:00.002-06:00

Today: this made me laugh

Also today: Drew introduced me to Dexter, which is awesome. Watch it. I am particularly loving the flashbacks of his childhood, watching his father attempt to teach him how to be a person. The making strange of mundane social interaction. Is murder more or less immoral without remorse?

In other news: I am in the process of making a tofu stirfry. I realize this doesn't sound like a complicated dish, but, if you're thinking that, you have clearly overestimated my culinary skill. This is a fairly significant risk; it is very possible I will burn down the building.

2008-05-31T22:17:00.003-06:00

Approximately 7 years and 10 months ago I was sitting in a decrepit lazyboy chair in the hallway in the back corner of a hospital ward playing Nintendo, when a scrawny, red-headed teenager with flaming red hair and hideous coke-bottle glasses positioned herself beside my television and began to discuss her habit of purchasing clothing without checking sizes and without trying anything on, such that the brand new, very baggy, dark blue pants with a slight sheen that she was wearing were about 10 sizes too big. It was fairly evident right off the bat that this eccentric character was not just any girl. I did not yet anticipate, however, that she would turn out to be the best person I have ever known. Today she wears clothing that fits, has very stylish glasses, retains the flaming red hair and is still just sort of... sparkly. And today she turns 23.

Happy Birthday Sarah!

2008-05-28T22:53:00.002-06:00

Things are good. For the first time in a long time, things are suddenly good. It may be premature, but I am thinking that things might stay good, if I can stay here. I’ve been alone for a few days now, all the major influences in my life absent. My best friend is in another province, the love-interesty-sorta-friend-sorta-more character is in another country, my family is incommunicado. I am alone. Organizing my life is me. Just me.

It’s wonderful. I feel the way I felt for about 10 seconds last March after evicting my ex-partner and resolving to, for the first time in almost four years, go it alone. That kick-ass Eurythmics-esque “sisters are doin’ it for themselves” sort of feeling. If you’ve never had this feeling, I suggest you leave your partner/boyfriend/husband/children/parents instantly and experience it.

It has been months of living, publicly at least, neutered (metaphorically and more literally—an anxious portrayal of asexuality.) In the process I’ve become, not surprisingly, boring (not to mention sort of annoying, un-insightful and needy.) What I am remembering now is that I’m not altogether awful, certainly not awful enough to be perpetually ashamed of myself. I may not be particularly intelligent, markedly gifted, breathtakingly beautiful or impressively pious, but I don’t /need/ to be. I’m not a Bad person. I’m just doing my best, surviving day by day and trying to avoid major fuck-ups. I think that’s good enough, at least for now; so I’m gonna go back to being me—honestly and unapologetically me—publicly and privately. I suppose it’s always a performance, but this spectacle will at least be less foreign.

Now days are organized around reading—engaging, sexy reading—and writing—interested, exciting writing. I don’t know if any of it is good—don’t honestly expect any of it will be—but I also don’t really care. Not right now. I’m having fun; screw the rest.

“The female mantis has been scientifically observed since at least the sixteenth century in the act of decapitating the male, not only after or during coitus but even before! He would be devoured completely after copulation. For centuries it was believed that such acts of cannibalism could be described in terms of utility: needing protein to make the newly fertilized eggs grow, the female could find great quantities in devouring her mate. However, it seems more likely that the males’ decapitation may well serve not only procreative but also specifically sexual functions for the female mantis: ‘Dubois’s theory… wonders whether the mantis’s goal in decapitating the male before mating is not to obtain, through the ablation of the inhibitory centers of the brain, a better and longer execution of the spasmodic movements of coitus. So that in the final analysis it would be for the female the pleasure principle that would dictate the murder of her lover, whose body, moreover, she begins to eat during the very act of making love.’”
- Elizabeth Grosz, “Animal Sex” in Space, Time and Perversion.

Oh man. Praying mantises are awesome.

2008-05-25T18:45:00.001-06:00

27 and 14 days respectively.

and so much to accomplish in that time...

2008-05-23T23:03:00.001-06:00

I miss my best friend :(

2008-05-20T21:39:00.012-06:00

Yesterday (because my family is ever so white and WASPy to the core) my father suggested that we lunch at the Country Club (yes; we are members of the Edmonton Golf and Country Club. Please don’t judge me) The Country Club is a surreal alternate universe in which everyone wears knee length shorts, denim is illegal, and no one makes less than $200,000/year. It reminds me of Pleasantville. The dining room is fitted with pristine white table clothes and polished silverware, chandeliers and giant windows displaying the view of the secluded green oasis cordoned off from the rest of the city as a haven for the rich and snobby. Over lunch they play terrible mixes of hits from the 70s, specially selected to appeal to the 50-60 year old demographic.

It’s fairly horrifying.

After lunch my mother and I took a long walk behind the new subdivision behind our neighbourhood. This subdivision was finally approved a few years back after much debate over the justifiability of tearing down acres of forest in order to construct mansions for families of four. Guess who won.

Now the subdivision is nearly completed and… the pictures mostly speak for themselves. The houses are enormous.

the front view

the back view

Apparently the must-have item in all new homes is an elevator. All these houses have elevators. Most also include a panic room. No one seems entirely sure what might be the cause for panic… unspecified danger seems to be all that was required to make the sell.

witness the elevator shaft. This particular house/elevator shaft belongs to the people who currently live two doors down from us. They have 2 children. This home will house 4 people.

It’s fairly horrifying.

If you cut past the giant private property sign at the end of the neighbourhood and scoot down the service road and over the large barrier constructed at the end, you wind up in the midst of a multitude of beaten paths through the woods and down to the edge of the river. But before this, you end up in the middle of a giant, empty field.

the field from above

...and from below

And then back into the woods and eventually you emerge onto a sandy beach. Later in the summer, when the water level is lower, the beach stretches out another 20 feet. You can sit in the middle of the river.

It’s fairly amazing.

Also on the schedule for yesterday was bathing the dog.

witness bathing the dog

Once the bathing was done and the little monster smelled no longer of poo, wet grass, and old food, and instead, bizarrely, of pina colada (who decided dog shampoo would be best scented as a coconut cooler?) she headed outside to dry in the sun...

I think it's good to see that no one in my family is confused re who calls the shots or takes priority. The seating arrangement seems well in order.

2008-05-15T22:10:00.000-06:00

He walks through the door and I’m astonished that he still exists. This is followed almost instantly by annoyance. What a ridiculous cause for consternation. Of course he still exists. What did I expect? I made a dinner date with him; why should I be surprised or offended that he showed up?

His hair is the same and his beard is the same and it’s the same smile and his easy eyes.

He’s wearing the purple shirt I bought him, and shoes I picked out.

He’s laughing in odd places, rambling, talking too fast. He does this when he’s nervous. This and playing with his watch and adding poorly placed space fillers like “yeah…” and “well…” for which he has no follow-up such that they linger awkwardly.

And then: “we can just get our usual.” The we’s and the our’s slip out and feel half like mistakes and half like non-committal pseudo-claims, or empty reminders.

As we catch up, little intimacies leak into responses. I know too much, and yet I don’t know him at all. But familiarities add up until I feel like I can’t sit at this table any longer. Everything is heavy with disconnected strands of an old life.

He’s proposing to his new partner next week. I hear the elaborate plan. /This/ is what should hurt, but it’s only surreal and dulled and disorienting. This isn’t the worst of it, or even a highlight. It’s the little bits of him that I still have. Inconsequential idiosyncrasies that only a partner would know, things I didn’t realize I’d held onto, that I didn’t mean to keep or remember. It’s the bits he has of me, despite everything else and distance and time and lives that don’t touch.

At one point he tells me he reads his blog and says “he’s smart. I don’t even understand it, but you would.” And I feel like I might vomit and I have no idea why.

He hugs me goodbye and it’s almost awkward. I leave quickly so he doesn’t see me cry.