I’m not afraid to shamelessly self-promote

Well now that I’m actually going to BlogHer and actually get to speak at BlogHer on a panel with two amazing queer bloggers, (Liza and Stacy, they rock!) I think I should do a blog re-design. The problem is that I’m way to lazy to do this and really need an assistant. Unfortunately there is no money left in my (non-existent) disposable income for an assistant. I figure I have a few choices:

1. Just do it myself.
2. Beg someone to do it.
3. Trade sexual favors.
4. Whine until someone helps me.

When you stop by here and see that things are different, you’ll know that one of those choices worked out for me. In the meantime, here is the description of what Stacy, Liza and I will be speaking about:

Room of Your Own 2: Blogqueers - LGBTQ BloggersQueer bloggers are in every corner of the blogosphere. Sometimes, but not always, their identities bring many issues to their blogging because they write and live through the lens of being queer. Their community is made up of mommybloggers, lifebloggers, craft bloggers, garden bloggers, foodies, business and marketing SMS pros, political pundits, infertility bloggers, literary bloggers, special topic bloggers and bloggers who feel that they don’t fit into any niche.

So let’s discuss some of the things that come up when blogging, such as: What is the state of the LBGTQ community? Does it meet your needs? Do you feel accepted by straight bloggers in your niche? Do you feel safe enough to blog out of the closet? Have you experienced backlash, and if so what has helped you respond to it? How have you dealt with your partners’ and friends’ thirst for privacy? And perhaps most importantly, what support do you need to continue blogging with your fullest passion and truest voice? Join Kathryn Martini, Stacy Jill Jacobs and Liza Barry-Kessler as they discuss with you the answers to these questions.

That’s a little bit fancy, isn’t it?

There is one wee bit of sadness about this particular break-out session. It’s at the exact same time that Melissa Lion is also speaking, which means that she can’t come and pretend she’s a lezzie and ask poignant questions and I can’t go and pretend I’m a fancy businessy type person and ask her questions. I’m hoping someone will live-blog her session so at least I can hear what’s happening.

In other news: I’m getting some projects done around the house, my kids are cranky, I think I may ban sleep-overs for the rest of the summer, I need a good therapist, and it’s going to be god-awful hot the entire weekend.

Why is everyone so damned cranky around this house? It should be a happy time and a happy place.

Can someone please recommend a therapist?

Please?

It’s not even July

There are two full months of summer break left and I’ve already been exposed to every show imaginable about teenagers. Some sing, some surf, some do gymnastics and are bulimic, some are witches. Oh and that one show with Tamara from Tia and Tamara. I don’t know where Tia is but Tamara seems to be a slut.

It’s been a Big week. My mom had body parts removed, I sat in a hospital waiting room for 14 hours, HG and I went to Happy Hour with her team, I found out I’m actually GOING to BlogHer after all, I went to therapy, a politician got caught doing the nasty in Argentina and some celebrities died. Sad.

It’s a championship bout weekend for The Rose City Rollers and I’ve been twittering and facebooking my little heart out to help bring people to the bout because I do that on the side in my free time. Yes. My Free Time. Those extra hours in the day when I’m not taking care of people, working, or sleeping. Yep. Those hours. I hope you’ll come to the bout. You want to see HG play, right?

Did you catch that thing about me going to BlogHer after all? I prayed to Jesus and offered sexual favors and called the lesbian mafia and a ticket came available to me. God love the Lesbian Mafia. So it looks like I’ll be rubbing elbows with Eileen Chaiken and hopefully she’ll introduce me to Bette or Alice and Alice will fall in love with me and want to run away with me to an island where we’ll have hot sweaty sex in a hammock on the beach while sipping tropical drinks and her singing me love songs.

Or something along those lines.

Even if that doen’t happen, I am thrilled that I get to go and I learned a very valuable lesson about procrastination and the power of positive thought. Of course I’m broke now, but hell, that’s just money and there is always more money to be had. I’ll think positively about that next.

Oh and there’s one other little thing about BlogHer. If you click here and look at the agenda and scroll down to Day #1, Breakout Session #1 you may see someone you know (hint: me) and someone else you may know too.

Fancy.

In the meantime, my kids just left for the weekend and my house is in Weekend Quiet Mode and I am Thankful. I’m sitting in my reclining patio chair in the sunshine looking at my beautiful plants and ignoring the fact that my living room desperately needs to be vacuumed.It’s lovely.

So much to do but so much more to be had just by sitting and listening. It’s been a big week and I deserve to savor those moments because I know I don’t do enough self-care and when that happens I turn a little cranky. Or into a raging bitch, take your pick. The point is that everyone needs to just sit and be sometimes and not worry about the chores that need to be done or the emails that need to be returned. It’s a crazy world out there and anyone of us could drop dead in an instant and then it wouldn’t really matter if the dog poop was picked up in the yard. The tricky part of this “Ignore Stuff and Sit in The Sun” theory is the application but I do encourage everyone to try it at least once this weekend.

So go ahead, comment on this blog post and put your computer to sleep. Grab your sunglasses and go outside. Give yourself 15 minutes to just be.

When you’re finished with that, have a kick ass weekend!

I really am a blogger

Sometimes I even blog about interesting things. This past term of school drained every bit of energy out of me and I had a terrible time finding moments to do anything that I enjoy (other than wasting time on Twitter and Facebook but some of that was work related.) School drained me. (Did I mention that?) Sometimes I don’t know how I’ll be able to finish all the way to my Master’s Degree but then I remind myself that I can do it, I just have to take it one step at a time. I also need to lower my expectations for myself and realize that I can’t do it all, I just can’t. Going to school full-time is equivalent to a full-time job when you factor in homework and studying and commuting. I also have a part time job as a freelance writer and even though it’s very part-time I spend a lot of mental energy on it. I also take care of my three children and my house; I do all the cooking, pack lunches every day, run kids around to practice and appointments and games and other activities. I do most of the housework (except laundry because of the “sock issue”) and all of the shopping.

It’s fucking exhausting.

Sometimes I get cranky.

But now it is summer and I’m putting that all behind me now. I’m going to enjoy my summer and read for pleasure and blog and, (don’t judge me….) scrapbook. Kennedy’s baby book isn’t even finished and she’s TEN. How pathetic am I?

My Mom is having surgery today and I’m sitting in the waiting room to hear how she’s doing. I’m sure she’ll be fine but the doctor (he has long hair and pierced ears and looks like a hippy) will be removing two feet of her intestine, which really is kind of yucky. There’s a lot of that in there you know, the intestine, so I think she can probably spare some but two feet? She had to sign a release giving them permission to dispose of it. Seriously? Did they think we wanted to take it home with us? “Oh, don’t mind that container in the fridge, that’s just my mom’s intestine.”

There are a lot of lezzies in this hospital. So far I’ve counted five and that includes a doctor who I happened to have met on our last Olivia trip. We’re Facebook friends but I didn’t want to be a dork and wave and say hello. She’s a surgeon and there is a certain decorum you know. She did see me topless and drunk so I thought I would keep my mouth shut.

Speaking of vacation. We just got home from one and it was fabulous. The weather was beautiful, the girls got along (almost) the whole time and we all had a very fun week. Coming home was a bummer (as it always is) but slowly I’m returning to reality–unfortunately while in a hospital waiting room.

While we were on vacation in Hawaii Jon and Kate’s marriage fell apart. For the record, remember when I said that I had an affinity for her? I’m way over it. As a matter of fact anything that was ever between us is over. I can’t even imagine going through a divorce with eight children while being televised and I can’t imagine what the Divorce Diet will do to her–she’s already skinny.I hope she and Jon can get through this amicably and not damage their kids. I hope that if Kate decides to re-marry a woman Jon doesn’t say things to their children like, “Lesbians are gross.” I hope if Jon gets re-married it’s to someone nice and smart and knows that you don’t need a passport to go to Hawaii. I hope that they can communicate somehow other than by e-mail only and I hope that Jon isn’t abusive and mean and hateful to Kate every chance he gets. I think that’s possible.

Isn’t it?

I really am a blogger but it looks like I’m going to be missing BlogHer this year because I’m a complete idiot. I arranged to share a hotel room with Melissa Lion, I had the flight schedule figured out and blocked the entire weekend out for months.

I forgot to register.

There are 1,000 people on the waiting list and even though Melissa Lion says she’s not mad at me and that I’m never, ever, ever again allowed to say, “You’ll be mad at me,” I feel absolutely horrible and sick about the entire thing.

Do I secretly hate myself and think I don’t deserve to do something fabulous for myself so I subconsciously sabotaged this experience to punish myself because I feel guilty and unworthy?

I’ll ask my therapist on Thursday.

Make that six lesbians.

*****Well Internet, it looks like the Heavens opened up and the God of Lezzie Blogger’s grace was shining on me because I’m going to BlogHer after all!

Aloha

So school is over for the term and I can’t tell you how relieved I am but I wish someone would tell my body and my head: they haven’t yet been informed. Tomorrow we fly away to an island in the middle of the Pacific ocean where a cocktail with an umbrella is waiting for me.

I learned a lot these past ten weeks at school and I was going to share a bit of it but I’m too tired today. I will tell you this: Love is a Verb not a Noun, People never stop learning and growing, To have a healthy marriage you must avoid: Contempt, Criticism, Defensiveness, and Stonewalling, and finally, Mi esposa es muy guapa y yo tengo tres hijas.

I started this post and intended to finish it later when I had time and then didn’t have time. So I will bid you all adieu my internet friends and will catch up when I return.

Aloha!

What I’ve learned about being a Derby Widow

Nearly a year ago HG told me that she wanted to try-out for roller derby, which I promptly told her, “Hell No.” I didn’t want her to get hurt and even though I’d never actually seen a derby bout (game, match?, I didn’t know then…) I was sure she would get beat up and then who would pay the mortgage? So we went to a fundraising dinner and saw some roller girls who were there volunteering. They didn’t look overly scary. Soon after we went to our first bout (game, match?) and I agreed that HG should try-out. After that, everything fell into place and I knew before she even tried out that she would make it. I knew after she made it to the Fresh Meat team that she would be drafted to a team her first time out–and she did. What I didn’t know was how much all of this would change our lives.

Before I went back to school (and had the kind of job where I went to work and was around people) HG’s interests consisted of me, running, doing the laundry and watching Law and Order. Now there is nothing wrong with these things as interests but because HG moved here from California and didn’t have any friends here–she didn’t really have her own circle, her own thing, her own (life) outside and independent of our relationship and what friends I had at the time. This was a bit of an issue at times because this meant that her energy was very focused on the interests that she did have and there is only so much laundry to do in a day. Although she never articulated it, I’m sure it was pretty depressing to be home (doing laundry) without her own gig in life. We all need our autonomy and to feel as though we belong somewhere. We all need a place to direct our energies, our time and our talent. I’ve always had these things–my life has always been full of ways for me to develop my interests and share myself with the world. I wanted this for HG.

She found that in Roller Derby and surprisingly, so have I.

Joining a roller derby league is not just playing a sport. These girls are so damn dedicated and work hard every single day; they practice a minimum of three nights a week, they volunteer their time to the league and to other charities, they set up, clean, and tear down before and after bouts, they sell tickets, they promote their teams and the leagues and every day throughout the day are team and league issues to talk about and deal with.

They don’t get paid. They pay dues to have the privilege of doing all of this. They don’t get news coverage by local sports media, fame, or notoriety. They do all of it for the love of the game and for the sense of belonging that comes from being part of something that is important.

Why is it important?

It’s important because we live in a world that is dominated by men and male interests. We live in a world where a strong woman is considered threatening and wrong.

We live in a world that the ideal woman looks like this:

Not this:

These girls are Bad Ass. They skate fast, they hit hard and they take a risk every time they get on the track. Yes, they are wearing pads but they are also have wheels on their feet and moving faster than a football or basketball player can run. Bumps and brusies are every day and sometimes injuries are much more serious: black eyes, broken jaws, broken bones, torn ACL’s, back injuries, shoulder injuries, you name it. And what do they do when they get hurt like that? Wait until the doctor says they can skate again and get right back on the track. Bad Ass.

In our patriarchal world that doesn’t encourage women to express themselves this way, roller derby is a tool for change. Derby girls are free to be serious athletes and sexy at the same time. They don’t subscribe to “societies” version of what size, shape, and demeanor they should have–they look and dress how they like and if that means ripped fishnets and hot pants–they bring it. I’m constantly impressed with the level of self-esteem these girls posses and how different that is from most of the rest of us; non-derby women have a lot to gain and a lot to learn by watching skaters. I’m so proud of HG and what she has accomplished in derby. She’s worked hella hard and dedicated and focused a tremendous amount of time and energy to this part of her life. The results are beautiful to watch.

What I didn’t realize about all of this was what the impact would be on me. I’m cool with HG being gone three nights a week for practice. Two nights a week I don’t see her from when she kisses me goodbye in the morning until I’m getting ready for bed–but that’s okay and the sacrifice is worth it. The impact that has surprised me has been all positive.

Somehow I’ve become a part of this. HG’s team mates are my friends now. I spend more time with them than I do any of my other friends. I spend almost as much time doing social media for the league as I do for myself. I get excited reading live tweets from team bouts I don’t even know about; I peruse online skating stores more than any other and I don’t even skate!

It’s crazy.

I was relieved when HG found something of her own to do and somehow it’s become something we share. (I asked HG and she’s okay with sharing derby with me as long as she’s the only one who skates, which I assured her would remain the case!)

So what I’ve learned about being a derby widow? What I’ve lost in time with HG, I’ve gained tenfold by the new friends and exciting projects that I get to be a part of. Supporting roller derby is supporting women and promoting feminism. We need strong-ass-kickin-hard-hitting women in the world to show young girls that they can do anything!

It’s important and it matters.

If you have a roller derby league in your area, go watch a bout. Who knows? Maybe you’ll be inspired to try out!

If you’re in Portland, you probably know where to go, but if not here’s the link.

Countdown: Summer

Four Days of School Left.

Then, Hawaii for a week and a nice summer for all. There is so much to do between now and then including my new “Body Cleanse” that I’m doing to prepare my body for a bathing suit. I have switched to a completely Vegan Diet and eliminated coffee and most sugar. I need to go to Trader Joe’s today and buy stuff that I can actually eat but seriously I feel skinnier already. (I know that’s not possible, just humor me.) Really, I’m not trying to lose weight as much as I just want to flush out all of the bad stuff from my body and see how I feel. Since turning 40 the part of my body I dislike the most (my flabby tummy) seems to have become even more flabbier than ever. I’m hoping this may help along with the Pilates I’m planning on doing later. I don’t want my body to go into shock so I should take it one step at a time.

My 12 year old daughter left today for Outdoor School. She’ll be gone all week and I’m happy for this for two reasons. One because she’ll have a great time and two, because anytime we changed the dynamics of our household slightly for a short amount of time, things seem to calm down in a weird way. I could use the calm. I’m trying to finish up my end of the year school projects and I have no motivation to do so. Right now I’m procrastinating writing a Psychology paper that is due tomorrow because I just really don’t want to do it. Sometimes I think I can’t do something and then I realize that I can. Today is one of those days. I’ll get through it and then, Summer.

It’s June. It’s PRIDE month! Even Obama made a declaration. Wow. If you identify as GLBTQ, what are you proud of? What does PRIDE mean to you? I wrote about this in my Just Out column last week, did you read it? optical communicationsIt’s here.

I’m proud of so many things. Mostly I’m proud and happy to be living my life authentically and having the love that I do. It’s so sappy but there isn’t a day that passes that I’m not grateful for the changes I made in my life. I’ve never regretted a thing and I’m thankful that everything fell into place as it has. My wish is that everyone can have the same experience of living completely. There’s a lot of Pride living your best life–and I definitely have it!

I hope everyone takes some time this Pride Month to think about what brings you pride.

Let me know what those things are!

Oh What a Beautiful Morning

Now you’ll be singing that song all day, won’t you?

It seems that summer has arrived in the Portland area, I shouldn’t probably say that because now it will rain until July but I don’t care because I’m going to enjoy the sun while it is here. I have a bunch of new plants to plant this weekend including a new blueberry plant to go with my other blueberry plant because my oldest daughter Mikayla told me that you have to have two. I guess they get lonely and don’t make berries if there is only one. I also bought three pots for my front walkway. I’m going to do something LeLo told me about last year and make a Thrill, Fill, and Spill pot. I’ll take a photo, it should be cool.

We went camping last weekend. On Memorial Day weekend. HG told me to remind her not to do that again. We had a beautiful spot right on a river but a couple of hundred yards down the dirt road there was a group of about 40 people, all with loud pick-up trucks who enjoyed blaring heavy metal as loud as possible. They also enjoyed screaming. Now I like heavy metal, it reminds me of my youth and I’ve been known to scream a time or two, but never at the same time. When camping, this behavior should be curtailed out of respect for other people. And nature.

Ginger stayed home from camping because we’ve been babysitting a very large dog named Blue since last Wednesday and Gingy is not pleased with him. Blue is still a puppy and is very active. Very active. Gingy is not a fan of active large dogs.

Did you know that hugging on school campuses is the new thing? I think its nice and I may just start hugging people at school. If you see me, lets hug. School is out for the summer in 13 days, which is 5 school days and 1 final day. I’m not counting down or anything, really I love school. This is a good thing because according to my advisor if I only take 12 credits per term and don’t go to school in the summer I will graduate with my Master’s in exactly 150 years. I’ll have a lot of time to hug people.

My daughter Mikayla is being “Promoted” to the ninth grade. When I was her age we just called it the end of eighth grade but now it’s a big deal. We had to go dress shopping last night and she found one she likes that is very grown up looking. I’m not sure when it happened that my daughter stopped shopping in the girls section and started wearing a size 5 but it has. I don’t even shop for my girls anymore because I don’t trust that they would like anything I picked out. When did that happen? Luckily they still like me and still want to hang out with me. I have a feeling that won’t last too much longer.

One of my best friends from when I was Mikayla’s age friended me on Facebook. Every time that happens I reminisce about my childhood/teenhood and remember what I did back then. After that, I take a Xanax and say a prayer to whomever will listen.

Lord help me if she’s anything like I was. My mother’s wish would come true but I may end up in the psych ward. Maybe I should start packing just in case.

A Matter of Class

I clearly remember sitting in the Laundromat on hot summer days while my mother washed our laundry. When I was about five or six we got a washing machine—it was a gold Kenmore and my mother was thrilled—but we didn’t have the dryer until much later so my mother hung our clothes out side on the line to dry.

Our house was very old and my parents rented it for $100 a month and we lived on my mother’s small salary while my father went to college on the G.I. Bill. For extra money, my mother would clean apartments sometimes and I would help her by “helping” clean the refrigerator. Childcare was an issue for my mother and I remember being left in strange places where I didn’t know anyone: my most vivid memory of this is being left at a strange woman’s house who smoked and watched television the entire day. I sat in a corner of her house and played with my Barbie, miserable and missing my mother. I don’t think I knew at the time that we were poor because everyone else around us was poor too. It wasn’t until much later that I realized where I had come from was not the same place that I ended up.

My mother went on to become a nurse and my father a white-collar insurance adjuster and even through their subsequent divorce my mother was always able to provide for me, albeit not glamorously. We never went hungry and never worried about where we would live. My troubles were few and as an adult I made my own way in the world in a similar fashion. I’m grateful that my family was able to upwardly move into a more middle-class lifestyle and I try very hard to remember how easily I could lose what I currently have.

Until I went back to school and began to learn more about oppression and how class issues affect our world, I never gave class status much thought. I’ve learned that for some reason when we talk about oppression, we rarely relate it to class. Instead, marginalized minorities compete in our “oppression Olympics” and forget about that group who is continuously oppressed with little chance for freedom—the working poor.

My own middle-class lifestyle was something I completely took for granted and worse, I wanted more. Realizing my own privilege in regards to class is very important especially when considering that even if I were to lose every material possession I own tomorrow, I would be able to rebuild what I had lost much more quickly than someone who did not share my same class status. Because of my: race, education, connections, family and community support, my family and I would probably be okay, even in the worst of circumstances. This is something I never considered until now and I will always try to remember that I have a responsibility to use my privilege for good.

Addressing the issues of class and the struggle of power needs to begin with individuals and our personal responsibility to recognize our own privilege and be aware of why we are in the position we are in. Part of being privileged is not realizing you have it and that is exactly where people of privilege need to begin in order to make change. Each person needs to take a look at their position in this world and make a commitment not to look down on or criticize those who don’t share our same status.

Just like I do not tolerate people using racist or homophobic rhetoric around me, I will no longer tolerate negative comments about the working poor. I will also point out to others (gently) when they are being discriminatory towards a group of people based on class because somehow, we as a society have easily accepted doing so. When people make negative statements about poor undocumented immigrants, crack addicts, welfare mothers, white trash, gang bangers, ghetto breeders and the like—they are being discriminatory not as much about race, but more about class. Groups of different races, religions, and cultures seem to be just fine, as long as they are in a similar class as we are; it’s when they are poor that they become something much less.

Immigrants with money don’t need to come to this country illegally, they are afforded the luxury of Visas and green cards; housewives in the suburbs addicted to pain medicine and Xanax are no different than the “crack mothers” we like to demonize; rich people take advantage of corporate welfare every day and mobsters are nothing more than rich gang members but somehow their status is elevated significantly.

These are the things that need to be realized.

As part of my responsibility, I will carry this message forward and be an example to others. Change in the world begins with ourselves and sometimes just changing one small thing has a much larger effect than we realize. Dr. King once said, “The arc of history is long and it leads towards justice”. I believe this justice is for all people of all: colors, creeds, sexual orientation, religious beliefs AND class.

HG The RG

Hottie

Warning: You’re risking your life

So I hear that Craigslist is going to start posting a warning on their “Erotic Services” page stating that those who place ads there are risking their life. This, of course, is because of The Craiglist Killer.

When I heard this, I had to inappropriately laugh a little bit. Not because I think it’s funny but rather ironic.

How many women have been killed by “Craigslist Killers?” At least one that we know of for sure but I don’t believe that there are epic numbers. Of course, one person dying at the hands of another is always terrible but perhaps the “warnings” on Craigslist are a bit misplaced. Instead, perhaps we as a society should focus on what IS killing women in epic numbers.

1 out of 4 college aged women are forced to have sex at least once while in college yet we don’t give female college students entering college a written warning that states, “There is a 25% chance that you will be raped while you are here for the next four years.”

When a woman comes in for her first pre-natal visit for her pregnancy the doctor doesn’t tell her that the number one cause of death for pregnant women is homicide by her male partner.

When a woman signs her marriage license there isn’t a line near her name that states: “Each year 5.3 million women will be abused by their husbands, you could be one of them” (25% of women report being physically harmed by an intimate partner in their lifetime) or “WARNING: Each year over 1,200 women are killed by their intimate partners.” (That’s an average of Three Each Day.)

We don’t tell middle and high school students that girls between the ages of 12-24 are at the greatest risk of being raped or sexually assaulted and that 73% of those rapes will be at the hands of an acquaintance or family member.

Women are much, much, much more likely to be harmed or killed by their boyfriends, fiances, husbands, or partners than they would ever be at risk by a stranger yet we don’t warn women on a regular basis to be cautious of the men that they share a home with.

Instead we focus on a stranger.

I realize it is much easier for us as a society to focus on some arbitrary medical student from Boston who is normal looking and now we’re terrified of Craigslist. The fear is misplaced. We really should be afraid of what is right around us, which really is scary.

Instead of being scared do something productive and donate to your local women’s shelter. In Portland we have The Portland Women’s Crisis Line; I’m sure you have something just as worthy where you live. Focus energy on doing good instead of being afraid and hopefully we’ll have a lot less to be afraid of.