Long Time No Blog!

     A lot has happened since the last time I sought solace in the release of my thoughts here. My life is completely different. I'm completely different. To say that I'm not who or where I thought I would be today is an understatement. In 2012 I lost my marriage to Chew Toy, and my reproductive system in one fell swoop. I won't get into the gory details, but suffice to say, I'm glad I made the decision not to blog during that time. The circumstances leading to our breakup and my precarious health were too difficult and personal to share with the world. Looking back now I think I would have said things I would have regretted, and that would have irrevocably hurt us both. But time has helped tremendously and I am happy to say with complete honesty that Chew Toy and I have come to be great friends, and I believe we will always have a healthy love for each other.

     Chew Toy, if anyone remembers, is the nickname I gave my ex-husband after a he suffered a dog attack. The giant holes in his thigh healed nicely and he even fought to save the dog from being put down. Both attacker and atackee are doing well, thank you very much.

    I have since left the state of Florida for the crisp, cold air of the North. I now call Northwestern Pennsylvania my home. I love it here. I missed the changing seasons and looking forward to Fall fashions. Yes, I even missed the snow. And let me just say, my hair looks fantastic! No more crazy humidity! Did I mention how much I DON'T miss alligators or snakes falling out of trees?! For serious!

     In other news, I am working as an Interpreter and am still performing. I have a new love in my life who I will refer to as "Mister."  Not in the creepy The Color Purple "Mister" way, but in an affectionate, non threatening way. Ok, if anyone has any suggestions for a new nickname, I'm open to it! He's fantastic and we're two peas in a pod, for sure. I'm super happy :D

     The most important lesson I have learned since I was last here is that Change Is Good, and Fear of Change should be faced no matter how scary it can be. How else will we know what we're made of? I was starting my life over with almost nothing - and I was in my 40s. Trust me when I say that fear was a constant, but I had to make that change or risk losing myself to misery. I have no regrets.

     It's good to be me again.
   

Recognizing the Feminist Within

The word "Feminist" usually conjures images of icons like Sojourner Truth and Gloria Steinem, and rightly so. Without these women and the countless others who fought so hard, and those who continue to fight, where would we be today? We'd be in 1950. We'd have no voice. We would be without freedom. That's what it boils down to; the freedom to be a productive human being in the capacity of your choice; the freedom to choose to be a reproductive human being. That's it. Male or female, that's what we all want. Does that make us all Feminists?

I never considered myself to be a Feminist. I actually had to think about it when someone called me one recently. I suppose I didn't think about it because I'm a Humanist, but the recent "War on Women" has me rethinking a few things. I think back to the first moment I became a Feminist. Of course, I didn't know it then. I just knew that something wasn't right. It was the first time I said out loud, "That's not fair!"

I was in Catholic school and all of us prepubescent girls were taken to the cold, musky basement far away from the boys to be shown a film about menstruation and reproduction. God forbid boys learned about it, too. Seriously. God forbade it. The film was a cartoon which was stopped every so often by Sister Knuckle Rapper to tell us, "The reason it hurts is because you're all sinners because you were born female." She smiled when she said it.

That moment changed me forever. I started to look at things in a different way. It wasn't like the time I tried to pee over the fence in the backyard like my brother when I was four. It was a lot less hilarious and didn't involve yellow shoe laces. It was serious business. It was the business of equality. I started to see unfairness everywhere. I saw it at home, in magazines, on television, the radio. I've been fighting against it ever since without even realizing it. It's become second nature. I don't carry signs, I don't belong to organizations, I just try to live free.

I have no children. That has always been my choice. I'm not complaining about paying taxes to fund public schools for other people's children, or for people with lots of kids to get medicaid, WIC, etc. I'm not complaining that paying a tax for contraception is a hell of a lot cheaper. I'm complaining that there are people who are complaining about the wrong thing. Uninformed people at that. People who want to stick a wand up my vagina should I choose an abortion after being raped. People who know nothing about the human body or medicine making rules about what I do with my body.

I now see time going backwards. People trying to take away that way of life that I have taken for granted. Do we have to take to the streets again to regain the simple freedom of choosing when and if we reproduce? States passing bills that keep women from access to that basic freedom. Contraception is Freedom.

Yes. I'm willing to take to the streets to maintain that freedom. Yes. I'm a Feminist.

End of a Romance

The last typewriter factory in the world closed its doors. It almost feels like the end of a romance. I remember my little Smith Corona in middle school. I used to love the feel of keys underneath my fingers and the smell of the ribbon. Pressing the keys to flip up the type bar and hearing that chick! chick! chick! ding! was downright Chopin-esque. It somehow made me feel closer to my words. As much as I love my computer and its access to the world, I still miss my little blue typewriter.