In the Land of the Living: Of Energy and Intuition

In the land of the living, I'm sometimes overcome with bursts of sustained energy. I'm overcome with one right now and from where it's coming from I don't know, but I keep channeling it back out into thing that I love, goals to which I am aspiring, and communities who need it. If you ask me to get involved in something right now I'm bound to say yes. Yes even if I am not sure if I have the time, even if it's not practical to get involved, even if I won't have any energy for myself and my own basic needs. I do this because it's the only thing I know what to do; it's my duty to use this energy to create.

The feeling is incomprehensible; certainly articulating it is challenging. I envision where from body energy is originating and this energy isn't coming from inside of me. It seems to be pouring - like a waterfall - out of the universe. It moves right through me and out of my feet back into the earth. It seems to be coming from an abundant source - Makers Lake - and is being channeled through irrigation canals into fields where growth and regrowth can be continued.

While I am rolling in the good of this energy right now, I am also a skeptic of it. In the search for what it means I also wonder if it is a harbinger of disease. Is it a burst of energy before a slow destruction? Is this what a recurrence of cancer feels like before the crippling pain? Is that twinge in the upper right quadrant of my lungs heart burn or it is cells building and building upon each other. I tell you this because I'm certain I knew about the cancer being born in my body long before it was found and years before any symptoms were present. I felt a prolonged warmth in my abdomen four years before the doctors found the tumor. I'd been through several doctors offices in search of the source of this discomfort and heat, I had ultrasounds searching through tissue and no one could find the source of the heat that I anguished over for years. I knew - deeply - that change was on the horizon for my body; I couldn't get anyone to establish that the intuition was spot on. Science failed me until it was too late to salvage my whole self. I had to sacrifice in the name of survival.

So perhaps you can understand why I can't just allow the animal instinct in me to roll in this beautiful feeling. I keep investing in the goodness of this energy while I can, I answer its calls and listen to everything that is speaking to me for the message, but the skeptic lives on, wondering whether or not the underlying message is your time here is short, do all that you have dreamed and do all that can.

So I do. Until the message clearly restates the time is now for you.

Have a Helena Day!

I was tempted to use a catchy title for my first blog since moving to Montana, but it seems like everyone has their hands on the phrase "Helena Handbasket." I found a god-loving basket weaver in Indiana who talks to her baskets and uses the moniker, a rock band comprised of middle-aged men in the Fargo-Moorhead area, apparently the local start-up roller derby team also goes by the name, along with seemingly right-leaning political blogger in a neighborhood near me. Instead, I'll use another local phrase dear to some Helena folk and heavily marketed by local artist Aaron Farseth and the local ice cream maker, Big Dipper Ice Cream. Instead of telling you I've gone to Helena Handbasket, I'm here to say, "Have a Helena Day!"

As you may already know, my welcome into this community hasn't sucked at all. I landed a job at both the local colleges (one private, one public) and was invited to teach creative writing classes to adults within the first two weeks of my arrival. I've just concluded teaching summer classes at UM-Helena, a small vocation college about three blocks from my house (hooray for bike commuting), and will start again in a week teaching three composition course for the fall. My students there range from too-smart-for-high-school kids to women in their sixties attending college for the first time. The diversity makes for interesting class conversations when I bring in controversial reading materials, but that is typically the case with the readings I choose. On Monday, I'll start teaching a argument/rhetoric course at the local Catholic private liberal arts institution, Carroll College. While I was once terrified that I'd burn up at the feet of the Mary Magdalene statue that greets me as I walk onto campus daily, I've found that my fellow professors (and even a couple of Carroll kids who took my summer class at UMH) are pretty damn cool. In fact, the dean of my department teaches a class titled "Truth, Lies, and Bullshit." Pfew. That really takes the pressure off. Anyway, Carroll is a beautiful little campus with approximately 1500 kids. Not surprising considering it costs about three times as much a year to attend than it does to go to a publicly owned college. Nonetheless, the kids are pretty traditional, mostly white with a median age of twenty, mostly from the northwest. And Carroll is no more than two miles from my house and UMH, so I'll get some good bike rides in before the snow falls... in about a month.

Besides the college classes, I'm also teaching in a small studio space in Reeder's Alley, a historic walkway in downtown Helena. We've named ourselves The Mad Muse Writing Studio. This picture actually shows the doorway to the studio space. See that narrow door right on the corner? Nope, not that one, it's the one to the left of it. There! Anyway, the exciting part about teaching in this space is that I get to teach classes I design to small groups of adults. Six max. For this fall, I've got two on tap: a Women's Writing Workshop and Breaking Through Writer's Block. So, if you know someone around here who might be interested in this kind of stuff--here comes the plug--send 'em my way!

Besides the job, our home is nice and quiet--well, quiet if you ignore the 28 trains that daily pass by just two blocks away. We are surrounded by a park on three sides and an empty lot on the other. Every night we have at least one and even up to five or six mule deer nesting in our back or side yard. We've had a lot of little Bambis lately, but we also have bucks with serious racks. Sharla throws firecrackers at them, I tend to walk and clap real loud yelling "yah yah" or something, but that will probably change in the fall when the bucks get a little more aggressive. This is part of the reason why we chase away the bucks (we're too tender to chase away the lone doe or the Bambis). The mule deer have been known to kill big dogs by stomping on them, so we'll not be taking our chances with the little wieners. Also, the deer like to snack on just about anything. We're trying to protect our gardens too.

Besides the deer, we also deal with teenagers selling drugs in the pull out between our house and the park, and when we get bored we call the cops on them. But most of the time, we're lazy from dealing with students all day long, and so their petty weed smoking gets overlooked. But really, besides the deer and the teenagers, the wildlife in these parts are pretty spectacular. Just east of town, and just about anywhere in the rolling dead-grass hills of Montana, one can find pronghorns, aka: antelope. We call them "white butts" because that's about the only identifying feature visible on them, as they blend into the landscape. . I haven't seen any moose yet, nor bear, not even elk, but I have seen some pretty spectacular birds. Today we saw a Common Shrike, a not so common bird whose numbers have been declining as of lately. I also saw a Lazuli Bunting at my feeder the first week I got here, then I never saw one again. Sharla has a particularly good eye for Sandhill Cranes and Bald Eagles and we see those all the time. Yes, turns out Montana is rich in wildlife. It's not just a rumor.

Well, I oughta save a little of my Helena adventures for later, because goodness knows there will be more to come. I just knew that it was time to start blogging again now that I'm all settled in. Hopefully, I'll have more for you, and you'll still read my rants when the infrequently occur.

"Have a Helena Day!"

Teaching: Anxiety, Awe, and Excitement.

A good teaching day induces both anxiety and excitement. Both of these emotions sustained today, despite the fact that I didn't step into a classroom once. It's conference week. One of the most important weeks for a teacher to connect to their students one-on-one.

I'm not going to ignore the fact that some days are bad teaching days. Maybe it's inappropriate conduct in class or a plagiarized paper that makes a bad teaching day, or maybe the lesson plan falls through and your students look at you like they'd rather be mopping floors than sitting in your class, or maybe you look at essay topics and think to yourself , My god, what is this world coming to? Yes, those days happen, but when an honest connection is established between a student and teacher (or professor), it's a magical and emotional sensation.

I've been teaching for three years now. When I started, I was more scared of my traditional Idaho students than the women transitioning out of federal and state prison whom I taught through the YWCA in Portland. While those women had the potential to be scary, it was not often in the classroom. I was much more scared of the assumptions and stereotypes I'd have to confront that were imbedded in the minds of my freshman and sophomore students at the University, than the women who'd done time in the joint (though some of them certainly came with their own issues). And while I have bad teaching days now and then, and I have to confront ignorance in my classroom, teaching is the most rewarding thing I've ever done.

Casual conversations with students seem to be the most effective motivator for student success. So many of my students have thanked me for getting to know their name... Their name! This really concerns me. While I understand that some undergrad classes have such heavy student loads that lecture halls need to be packed with students in order for the university to efficiently process students who have pre-requisites, it troubles me terribly that the relationship between professor and student is so distant. How are we supposed to be effective educators when we don't know our students, their realities, their concerns, their interests? I just don't get it.

I set out to really know my students, and admittedly, I don't get to know every single one of them. Some of them are more private than others, and that's just fine. But I certainly try to break through the power structure that assumes I am the teacher and you are the student, therefore you will be learning from me, not me from you. I think this is a false assumption, that instructors cannot learn from their students or that their life experience or specialized knowledge cannot teach a professor a thing or two. I really think that there is inherent value in attempting to level the power structure in a classroom, so that students not only learn from the instructor, but learn from one another. I am also a firm believer that information is not delivered in the classroom (though, sometimes a lecture will have to go that way), so much as it is exchanged. Everybody has a hand in the education process.

And so often I walk away from my classroom excited about the conversations that are happening on very important issues facing my students and me. They have interesting perspectives, they are willing to make public ideas which may not be popular in the broader communities in which they work, they are more often than not very thoughtful of their fellow students. They are willing to research their topics and be proven wrong; they are willing to change their minds, to grow.

This excites me more than anything. The topics we discuss in class are often terrifying predictions about our future, anxiety inducing topics, contemporary social issues, and strained social and political arguments. More often than not, no matter what the political leanings of my students, they are thoughtful with their responses and engaged in civil discourse. And when someone says something that is derogatory or uninformed, often it is my students that speak up and address the issues. Not often is it my job to address the occasional awful thing murmured in class.

Don't get me wrong. Once I year I have to deal with a derogatory term in my classroom, be it racist slurs, ableist slurs, sexist slurs, or homophobic slurs. While it's not allowed in my class, it still happens. And while this might infuriate me, cause my body to unnaturally heat, make my brain tingle and eyes fill with tears of frustration, it's also not often me that has to address these issues, and for that I am proud. My students aren't afraid to call their peers out. And they aren't afraid to do it in class because the tenor has been set early: my classroom is a safe place to exchange ideas, we are not always going to agree and that's okay. You come back to class and realize we are all at different stages in our education, and we hold no grudges when our opinions depart from others in our class. That way, everyone can return to their education without fear.

In conferences there is ample opportunity to get to know students, to know that they are people who have lives, who have lives outside of their education, to get to know their interests and all the things that they are doing to try to ensure an economically sound and stable future for themselves and their family. When they sit down beside me in my office, they become more human. They share their successes and their concerns, even their failures. And in that space where commonality is found in the everyday, a real relationship is established. Students, in fact, are the greatest reward of teaching. Seeing them succeed, seeing them evolve, seeing them challenge themselves and others, watching them navigating this crazy world is so rewarding. Seeing the diversity of human beings up close everyday, is exhilarating. Knowing that we can bridge political differences by a shared interest in bettering our communities and our world makes returning to the classroom that much easier.

But all this gloating, it isn't to say that teaching is easy. I have to be willing to bring difficult issues into the classroom and not just gloss over assignments and how they are structure and what is necessary to get a good grade. My students are not engaged by that kind of curriculum, they want to talk about relevant issues. It's not easy to approach real issues with real people, to listen to and deal with opinions that I do not share. It's anxiety inducing. It's scary to dissect, analyze, interpret, evaluate, and examine right beside my students. It's a job that takes thinking on my feet. I have to be adaptable to changes in collective classroom emotion any minute. It's not easy at all. And sometimes, at the end of the day, it leaves my body humming. Sometimes I hum with anxiety and some days I hum in awe. More often, I leave my classrooms excited than disturbed.

On days like today, my students leave me feeling better than when I awakened. My students and I let our conversations roll over the alloted fifteen minutes we are supposed to spend talking about their essay topics and grades. It's when we talk about their personal experiences or their concerns that I walk away energized. It's when we talk about a student's experience with losing friends to a drunk driving accident, or a student's learning disability, or a how a student's childhood home was foreclosed upon, or how contemporary and more often than not biased media makes certainty uncertain, that I make connections with students. These are the conversations that are important between my students and I. These are the conversations that help me to thrive as an instructor, that keep me returning to the classroom every other day with optimism. They are also the conversations that help keep my students stay engaged in the world around them and in the things that they care about.

This is what makes teaching so damn awesome.

Freedom to Marry Week Conversations

I signed up for this.

I didn't have to have a voice in the gay rights movement. I didn't for a long time. I sat quietly in my elementary, junior high, and high school classes and tried to ignore the nasty things said about people like my parents. I didn't call my friends out when they said "faggot" or "homo", "queer" or "dyke" - I might have even used the words myself. I even dated a boy who was admittedly against gay rights and was vocal about it too. I have a video of him from my 15th birthday and he's shouting into the camera, "Yes on 9! Yes, yes, yes!" which was the anti-gay legislation that Oregon voters had before them that year. I also briefly dated a boy who put his finger in my face in the dark back room of a party where we were supposed to be making out and said, with regard to his anti-gay rights thinking, that I would think like he did, or else...

I left the room that night, but I didn't leave the silence of the closet. My parents, by then, were separated; divorced if you will. Ellen came out, Matthew Shepard was beaten and killed, Teena Brandon was shot, and I didn't so much as blink a few times at the TV. I was straight, my biological mother was dating a man, and my other mother's mental health was in decline so my contact with her was sparse. My only impulse in my early twenties was to get drunk, get high, fill my bed with strangers and keep a full-time job so I could keep the lifestyle I had. I wasn't interested speaking out about my parents or my experiences. There was a complete disconnect between our lives, my life, and the lives of other LGBTQ people. All that mattered was me.
I'd like to blame that on age, but I also think that while I recognized that we were, that I was, surrounded by the gay community, I also felt like we were in our own bubble. Only when the political discourse became so inflamed did I recognize that my family, my experience, was not an island. Only then did I recognize that I was floating in the sea amidst thousands of people, millions of people, who had my family, my community, on their mind.

This became especially apparent when I started working for the Women's Resource Center at my community college, and most of the women who sat on the student leadership board with me were queer or lesbian or bi-identified. It was that year that I realized I too did not fit into the heterosexual box. I was scrambling to figure out how to date a woman and be from a lesbian headed household. I was trying to figure out how to be an activist, to be vocal about my experiences growing up amidst political turmoil. I wanted a voice in the movement. I'd been silent too long.

My first speaking engagement was terrible. In the college cafeteria during LGBTQ history month I said some sing-songy rhyme that tokenized just about every queer identified person in the room. I said, "Everybody should befriend a gay or lesbian." Ugh. Embarrassing. Thank goodness my friends were kind enough to just make fun of me for years afterward. But then, in 2005, I was invited to speak at Portland City Hall for Freedom to Marry week. I was nervous. I wrote out my entire speech. I read it verbatim stumbling over my words, poor spelling, and bad punctuation. Consequently, a lesbian columnist for About.com published this terribly written speech on the Internet. I had no idea how to write, or how to be a public speaker. I was just starting.

Six years later, I've spoken at conferences, in classrooms, in public arenas, on panels. My list of speaking engagements is longer than my publications. But those opportunities to speak are often opportunities to speak to the choir. It's the more personal exchanges that end up being more powerful, more stirring, more memorable, and sometimes more frightening.

Today, a colleague told me that fear is what the dominant culture wants me to feel, and that I should not feel fear; to overcome that impulse is success. While I appreciate that offering, it's also not so easy to just overcome fear and say to myself, "Nothing to fear." It's not easy to have conversations, whether civilized or not, and leave them as just conversations. I carry them with me for days. I remember what was said to me. I ask myself what I could have done differently. I think about how when something happens in the gay community, when there is news about the gay rights movement in the minds of the broader community, how the language (both positive and negative) seeps into the psyches of everyone. And it seems, when the rhetoric is most prevalent, that is when I get to have more one on one exchanges.

These are people that come to me. I don't often say, "Hey, let's talk about gay rights!" Most of these exchanges are with complete strangers. The young girl who sat next to me at a Rev. Jesse Jackson lecture on Monday night and said, "I grew up in a small town. I'm really uncomfortable around diversity" and so we talked about that experience, how she might confront that. She made me nervous what with how bold she was to just tell me about her prejudices. But it was a calm conversation, one that was difficult to have with all of the stereotypes and assumptions that she was putting on black people, people of color, gays, and Indians. Still, I stayed present for the conversation. I said "Bye" to her when she left. Then yesterday, on campus in front of a map of the states that showed where gay marriage, civil unions, and domestic partnerships existed and didn't, a man is ranting about how it shouldn't say "anti-gay legislation" because that would imply that the states are against gays, not against marriage. For a while we have civilized conversation, mostly because there is a third woman nearby who is keeping the tenor of the conversation balanced. Then he says something about how unlikely children of gay people are to be normal, not gay, successful. I tap him on the shoulder and say, "Pst. My parents are gay." I tape up a statement of support on the poster, one that says my full name, gives some of my story, when another man walks up and starts reading it while I return to the conversation. We start to argue about rights LGBTQ people don't have because they don't have access to marriage. I mention that partners and their families are sometimes kept from their partners in medical settings during emergencies, and that some people have died without their partners and children being told.

He says, "There is not one documented case of that happening" and I fucking lost it.

"Are you fucking kidding me!?" I squealed, and told him I'd bring him 15 documented cases if he wanted, and while I was yelling I told him about me and Brandy's motorcycle accident and how we were separated in the hospital and I was refused access to the Emergency room even though I could clearly hear her yelling that she wanted me there from behind the locked doors.

On the peripheral, a woman is walking in circles and fiddling with her cell phone, listening to us yell at one another. The other two people are telling us to calm down. She walks up to me and touches my hand, asks me if Brandy is ok.

I tell her yes and she tells me, "It's okay to walk away..."

It takes me a moment to realize where I am. There is no one in that space but me, him, and her, though I know there were others around, as the Commons are a main building on campus and student traffic is heavy. I thank her. I have no idea what my face might have been saying that told her she needed to remind me of other options. I turned away from him, from her, and walked out of the building. But on that wall in the Commons is my full name and my story. I walked away and kept looking over my shoulder. I thought about it as I sat at home that night. Where might a stranger find my personal information. Might I be harmed?

And then, this morning, a stranger messages me through Facebook. Says, "I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but I just read your article, "Growing Up with Lesbian Moms" and I wanted to know if I could ask you a few questions. I'm 26 and considering having children."

I reply, "Shoot from the hip."

I signed up for this.

Though I am tired of being self-deprecating, I'm tired of having civil discourse, I'm tired of being careful with my words and trying to convince people of how necessary it is that me and my community have access to and the privileges that hetero folk do. There are no excuses for the oppression, for the fear that me and others experience when we feel compelled to be vocal, or even when we cannot bear being civilized in our approaches to blatant bigotry. I'm fucking tired of being nice because for so long I've taken the offensive remarks, I've been careful with my words, I'm been a diligent and calm protestor. I don't want to write a nice memoir that doesn't point fingers, I don't want to be balanced in my approach to what has happened and what is happening. I want to pen a fucking diatribe, revenge prose, an angry essay that is unforgiving and vindictive.

I'm tired of being marginalized and oppressed.I'm tired of being unequal and treated unfairly. And I wish I wasn't so damn angry and scared.

When I return to my Facebook page today, a friend has posted the following quote: "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. "-Martin Luther King, Jr. It gives me pause, a moment to sigh. Even though it feels like I might be dying because of all the energy that I am sapped of when I am asked to speak about this issues, maybe it's true that the only time I am actually decomposing is when I am not speaking out...

A nod to you, Dr. King.

An Open Letter to Mike Huckabee.

Dear Mister Huckabee,

What a pleasure it was to come home this afternoon and find your recent comments on children of same-sex parents on my Google News-Feed. Oh, it troubled me for a moment, but it's given me a reason to blog again, and to address an issue that so often comes up for children with same-sex parents and their families. The judgement of our families from people who have no experience on the inside of them...

I guess it should be no surprise to me that you would call us "science experiments", but you should know that we are more often called "social experiments". There is very little science involved in the process of adoption. Where science comes into play is within the heterosexual relationship, rather. Isn't the mixing of body fluid and therefore genes more accurately a science experiment than the rigorous and sometimes enduring application process, the checks-and-balances, that a same-sex couple (or a hetero couple) must go through in order to adopt a child? Besides, get on the bandwagon Huckabee, your friends like to call us "social experiments"...

It also appears that you haven't done your research. I'll pay no mind to your opinion that totally ignores the multitude of research that has emerged from the sampling and study of children with same-sex parents. Resoundingly it's been proven that children with same-sex families are no better or worse adjusted than children with heterosexual parents. The American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry finds us no more likely to be gay, to be sexually abused, to have issues with gender identity, or to have demonstrated any different gender role behavior than children reared in traditional households (AACAP, 2006).

Look Huckabee, same-sex parents are not going to stop finding ways to fulfill their dreams of creating families. There are already many children of same-sex families in our world and there will be many more. At this time, approximately "96 percent of all U.S. counties have at least one same-sex couple with children under 18 in the household" according to the 2003 Census. "Yet only seven states and the District of Columbia have laws supportive of gay and lesbian couple adoption"(Urban Institute, 2003). So, I guess what I am trying to tell you is that you're not going to stop the already burgeoning same-sex headed family by denouncing them as "science experiments", so why don't you instead try to protect all children, instead of just children with heterosexual parents, adopted or otherwise?

Furthermore, children of same-sex families more often site judgements on their families from their external worlds as more troublesome than their experience than living within their families. That's right Huckabee, be proud that you are participating in a form of bullying, that you are contributing to rhetoric that is more damaging to children than the mere experiences of growing up in a home with same-sex parents. You are also contributing to the notion that no home is better than a home with two adults who are actively seeking to provide a home to a child who is in a system where there are more children awaiting adoption, than parents who are seeking to adopt.

This is the worst part, by denouncing our families, by making public your opinion of the parents of some children, you are not only shaming our home life, you are making us acutely aware that we are not accepted, that our families are not protected, and that not only are children bullied by children, but that children can also be bullied by adults, by institutionalized prejudice. It's a horrible feeling to be a teenager or a child in a world where people like yourself insist on continually marginalizing our families. For a child to make sense of this institutionalized hate is confusing, particularly when we find our homes, and our communities, safe and comfortable, and we find the external world cold and prejudiced.

Also, to denounce our families publicly is to also say that we are not recognized as families, that we do not face the same kind of problems that traditional families face. It sends the message to us that it is not safe to ask our communities, our governments, the institutions in place to protect every tax-paying citizen in the United States, to help us if we are facing problems. Problems such as mental illness or domestic violence or poverty. That if we ask for help with these familial situations that we will not only be scorned for asking, but that our families will be scrutinized as problematic, instead of the problem itself. This institutionalized double-closeting is yet another situation that arrises from your abhorrent public behavior.

What is the best part about what you had to say today? You are actively inspiring more children to stand up for their families and to be counted, and to be visible in the debate for equal rights. I am one of those children who came out of the 80s and 90s fiercely intent on joining the cause for equality. So, today, I guess I should be thanking you, for inspiring more of us to come out, to be counted, and to demonstrate that our families will exist with or without your approval, and that we will continue to fight for our parents and ourselves until we are protected by the laws of our cities, counties, states, and nations in which we reside.

So, thanks Huckabee.
I guess.

Sincerely,
Chelsia A. Rice

Games with Death

There are wicked games the living play when death is making it's long stride into our worlds, especially if there is time to consider it's arrival. We play with our positioning: How close do we want or need to be? How will our closeness or lack of presence affect the rest of the living? When do we arrive and say our goodbyes, and will death beat us to the bedside? Do we position ourself to see the decline, to witness death diminish the one(s) we love? And we ask ourselves the questions: Would we rather have death come swiftly, sweep through and pickup the living in it's talons, carry it away? Or does the time left with the dying bring more peace and resolution?

I once had a Scientologist roommate who was reading through one of R.L. Hubbard's massive mahogany leather bound books. That book sat at her bedside and I feared, though was curious, about it's contents. So, one day while she was away I snuck into her room, grabbed the book and took it to my room. I opened the book to the middle and started reading. Hubbard was saying that pain is experienced because actions are too swift. He gave the example of a bullet piercing a body. He said, if the bullet were to be slowly pressed into the body over a long period of time that there wouldn't be pain. I thought about it, even agreed with it, and suddenly felt I was being sucked into Hubbard's prose and brainwashed, so I closed the book and returned it to her bedside, but I've never forgot his philosophy on pain.

I've been avoiding (I am prone to avoidance) the pain that I knew would come from writing about the death of my dear friend, Stephanie, who has fourth-stage squeamish cell carcinoma, cervical cancer which has spread throughout her body to her organs and her lymph nodes. In November, a few short weeks after she was diagnosed, her PET scans revealed that the cancer had fused the lymph nodes around her spine in a large mass that spanned her lower lumbar to the middle of her shoulders. It was when I knew that Stephanie's time would come quickly. It wasn't her doctor's optimistic one-year prognosis that solidified my knowing; in the past two years I've seen two of my people die after the cancer was found near, in, and around their spine. I'm no fool. I knew we didn't have anything close to a year to share our precious time with Stephanie. A few days ago, Stephanie was transferred into hospice care.

So here I am, tweaking cheap-flight websites, trying to make reservations, trying to find the least expensive way to be with and comfort my dying friend, to commune in comfort with her family, and her chosen family, and I'm frustrated and angry that this positioning, this financial game, these questions and obstacles and considerations or even an issue when someone's life whom I care so much about may be gone in an instant. It's a frustrating and ridiculous.

And although all of this emotion of this positioning is so overwhelming that I find myself jolted awake in the middle of the night thinking her time has just come and gone, and pacing in the kitchen with my coffee in the early morning hours wondering how and when I will visit, I am at peace with Stephanie's impending passing. I am at peace with the arrival of death when it eventually comes. It's the time between knowing it will come and it's actual arrival that makes crazy. I've seen it unfurl in in my own family. How they bowed forward in their chairs, and hunched towards the bed with the mouths turned down. And nobody has enough alone time, no one feels they have had their final say, everybody wants for something more. Motivations all seem so suspect.

Whose need is the most genuine, the most important? How do we determine these things as we look upon this intimate process? Whose needs do we put first when there are so many who want to be and are a part of the process, who are dazed by all that needs to be resolved in such little time? I try to leave my own needs out of this scenario, though I am not foolish enough to believe that I also don't have my motivations. Yes, my visit is partially about me and my relationship with Steph, but I also want to be there to lay hands on, and comfort the ones whose pain is more severe than my own. The community of people around Stephanie who love her as much as I do.

I'm coming to you soon, Ms. Stephanie. And although you may not have the appetite, I will be bringing with me your favorite caramels.
With love and with peace in your process.

With love and peace for the many people who love you so much.

To Touch a Diseased Body

To touch a diseased body is powerful.
To watch a pillowy torso turn to a rocky terrain.
They mark her body with sharpies, map where her tumors are and point radiation into her abdomen. Her waist is bruised around her sides from injections, as if she’d been beaten and kicked.
She lies in a hot bath before me, naked, her body exposed and falling, wrinkles appearing at the corner of her mouth overnight. Her forehead wrinkles with concern, she can’t tell the difference between dreams and visions.
What is reality to any of us, anymore?
Time is lost in hospitals. A week is gone in a flash of a camera which strives to only capture what unity we have, bouquets in a corner, Mylar balloons with superficial prayers, a Chia pet farm in the window.
I rub her feet, I want to push the tumors from her body, I work her feet like dough, I watch her eyes tighten and her words stop when I find a spot behind her ankle bone, the pressure point for the ovaries, the place she feels so much relief when I coax the soft and pliable skin through my fingers.
I clean their house which has been left for days, maybe weeks, without being swept.
There are bags of movies that people have brought to occupy their minds.
The port for the chemo dangles from her arm, a purple and blue rubber cord bobs each time she reaches her arms to hug me. She can’t hug me long. Her body quivers, her hands shake. She has not yet cried on me, not until I kneel in front of her and hold her face in my hands and look her in the eyes. We stare at each other without saying anything, for so many minutes, blinking, and yet we hold our stares. She suddenly looks confused and smirks, she asks me what I am doing and I laugh as I cry.
I feel as if I am saying goodbye, as if we have words for one another even though we don’t have words. I get one chance to tell her before I leave, so I take the chance to tell her and this is what I say “I will support you not matter what direction of treatment you take. If you want to fight I will fight with you, and if you don’t then I support you". I think she hears me this time. We hold each other and she clutches and shakes out a few tears.
I am afraid I will never see her again that my last memory will be of me leaving her on her couch, when I feel like I should be with her for the journey. The entire journey. I just want to be there.

Nugget & Buddy: two-syllable, easy-to-say names for my two animals.

Nugget & Buddy: two-syllable, easy-to-say names for my two animals. One cat, one dog. Both ripe with character, both I love so much, both a big-ole pain in my ass, and pocket book.

First, Nugget, also known as 'beef stick' or 'Noooget' or 'Nugsie', bless her soul, is a 12 pound, 1/2 blind, diabetic, Chi-weinee (chihuahua/dachshund mix) who likes to chase anything that runs and throw herself off of high places even though she doesn't have the spine to support that impact. She was only two of these things, 12 pounds and a Chiweinee, when I got her off Craigslist with my former partner (ex is such a dirty word) from a clean-and-sober woman who was in the middle of divorce and selling everything (including her two dogs) so that she could live and drive her RV where ever the hell she wanted to go. We, knowingly, were getting Nugget to save our relationship in the same way that straight people have a baby to save a marriage.

A year after we got Nugget, after me and my "let's-get-a-dog-to-save-our-relationship" partner broke up and got together for the umpteenth time, on a weekend at the beach to revisit our relationship under more romantic conditions, Nugget came in after an afternoon pee only to turn around and pee again, and again. And then head for her water bowl with a voracious and unquenchable thirst and pee again, inside. Perplexed, we thought she'd got into a tide pool and ate some bad shellfish. But the peeing didn't stop, so we took her into the boutique-priced-vet that all vets are in Portland, when we got back into town and after several hundred dollars of testing found that, at the age of 3, she was diabetic, an illness that is expensive and hard to regulate. Even more expensive and hard to regulate for a 29-year-old, single woman, who likes to drink and go dancing, and is surviving on student loans and a server's income. Diabetes means a special diet and keeping a regular schedule and shooting your dog up with insulin every 12 hours (9 and 9).

Just so we're clear: Nugget isn't diabetic because I fed her twinkees and the fat off my steak every night, the diabetes came down through her genetic line.

At first I considered a rescue, or putting her back up on Craigslist because I didn't think I'd have the money to give her a good life, but after careful consideration and because I knew Nugget had been in three homes in her first year of life, I decided to give it a go and do my best to give her a stable home and a good life.

Needless to say, our first year was rough. Finding the right diet, not skipping shots, getting me trained to meet her needs was difficult. In May of 2008 she weighed 8 pounds and was practically a walking skeleton. Family and friends were split, as was I, on whether to put her down or try to help her recover. I decided to take the summer to try and get her regulated and make the decision after a more consistent regimen. Thankfully, we found something that worked: never missing shots, prescriptive food, lots of water, lots of money. Nugget is back at her normal weight and is doing fairly well, until lately when she's started having seizures.

This is the second episode this summer and it's gone the same way both times. In the middle of the night she pushes herself out from under the covers and falls on the floor without attempting to catch herself. Then she wakes up early and starts licking and pushing herself into my face, looking all around the room, her round body pulsing with muscle spasms. Then, for a few days afterward her muscles are weak and her balance unsteady. After this mornings episode I took her to the reasonably-priced-not-in-the-big-city vet for an exam and lab work. Our total expenditures for today: $201 and 3 lost hours of sleep. They gave me diazepam for her seizures (now you can be on the same medication as mommy!) and an anti-inflammatory (Metacam) and told me lab answers are to come by the end of the day...

Answers? Maybe...

Now, Buddy, the other break up based pet. Buddy, a short-haired, black and white who has also been known as 'Snake' and 'Budinski' and 'Fat bastard', came to me from the Oregon City projects shortly after my first major break up in 1998 with my first major boyfriend. I got him as a kitten and often slept with him in the nook of my collar bone, and since then he's thought it okay to still sleep there whether of not he weighed 9 or 15 pounds.

Today, Buddy is eleven years old (in his sixties in human years) and has lived with me in seventeen different home in three different states. He's been rather durable and accommodating, living with a variety of animals, in a variety of conditions and regions, with a variety of lovers and roommates. He's been the most reliable long-term relationship (which sounds like I've turned into that creepy cat person) up until recently.

About three years ago I took Buddy into the boutique-priced-Portland-vet for an exam for wheezing episodes. The vet blamed it on anxiety and I took his diagnosis as golden. But this year, when the wheezing episodes got more intense and were accompanied by a dilated pupil and raised third-eyelid, I took him into the reasonably-priced-small-town vet who found a lump in his throat and diagnosed him with Horner's Syndrome.

Since then, Buddy's appetite has decreased, his purrs and breathing have become more labored, he's lost weight, about three pounds, and sleeps all the time. I've tried changing his diet, giving him a variety of food, consulting the vet for treatments and what I've gotten is a shrug, following the offer to do an MRI to find answers, and another prescription for Metacam (at least both my animals are on the same drug).

Maybe I've always had a thing for differently-abled animals, after all, my first pet was a gray, one-eyed, long-haired, bladder-problem-ridden feline named Toke. But I've come to realize that at this point in my life of pet ownership, I am essentially running a convalescence/geriatric/hospice home for my pets. And that's okay. I love them both, and I am committed to them both, pain in the ass or not.

Not only is pet ownership expensive, it's fun, joyful, time-consuming, sleep-losing, awesome, heart-breaking, terrifying, and quite a commitment; a life-long commitment. I don't remember it being this way as a child. Was it that it wasn't as expensive, or that it wasn't my money being spent?

Regardless, I've come to understand that one should not take on the responsibility of pet ownership unless they are ready to spend the money, whether boutique-fees or reasonable-vet-fees, to maintain the health of their animal(s). And when my current pets pass I will likely take a break from ownership so that I can leave for the weekend without paying someone to come feed them, or without consideration of how to travel with them. But because I've been raised in a home that has always had pets as part of the family, I have a feeling it wont be long before I invite another animal into my home.

Then too, I'll be there to hold their paw through whatever health issues come their way, and hopefully my income can support providing them with the best treatment I can afford, and that is possible.

Interfacing With A Murderer

Minam is a place of solace for me; a locale where my distant relatives once tended to timber and made moonshine up the mountain during prohibition times. I go there to listen to the Wallowa River rush by, to watch the cedar waxwings flip and fly over the river catching small flying things, I watch the rafters put in across the river at the boat launch, listen to the Osprey's clip cry, and joyfully tend to customers in the market and people lodging at the motel.

Although I go to Minam to get away I often find myself working on small projects or motel upkeep; mostly laundry, which is a never ending chore. I always try to get a ride on the lawnmower if only for the excuse to sip a cold one while doing circles in the front lawn. I spent seven weeks working at the motel last summer and enjoyed most of my time there, with the exception of a few nights where I found myself alone in the canyon with no one in the motel.

I am afraid of the dark - particularly dark wilderness areas with little light pollution. I like to see what is coming at me and this is problematic even when I have the porch lights on all night. One night in Minam during my stay last year, some raccoons were fighting in the middle of the night, or god knows what, which nearly made me pee my pants. During a spring time visit, a mob of dear were eating grass around the back side of the manager's unit, snorting and brushing up against the walls of the motel which also scared the bejesus out of me, even though I knew damn well it wasn't a crazed serial killer. The issue is that the motel is the only lodging place between Elgin and Wallowa - a 30 mile stretch of a scenic by-way - which is remote but beneficial for us because the weary traveler can find a place to stay when they come through the winding canyon in the dark. But every time someone comes in a little past 10pm, it rattles me just a bit.

I've been to Minam three times this year; I just arrived home from a week in the canyon yesterday. I arrived last Thursday, a little after 5pm, to an empty motel - which I expected - and a damn hot summer day. My first customer rolled in around 6-6:30pm. Being that we are along a thirty mile stretch of well, nothing, people from the country or adjoining towns often drop in to chat, or use the telephone if there is an emergency in the canyon somewhere, or to grab a cold beverage or ice cream. So nothing to be concerned with when my first customer rolled down the driveway in a dirty and dusty Jeep Wagoneer - complete with fake wood paneling and came to ask me if I had a paper. In the car was a woman smoking a cigarette, a couple of dogs bouncing about her lap.

I grabbed the paper and handed it over to the man. He was about my height, tan from days in the sunshine, had on a pair of white paint splattered pants and a myriad of tattoos about his torso. He had big brown eyes and his hair was done. He got down on one knee in the gravel drive-way and turned the page to a article about the recent find of a murdered woman and her dismembered hand that was found in a local pond; a news report that I had been following since before I headed down to the canyon. For a moment I thought it peculiar that he would come in, ask for a paper, and go for that column, but the county was alight with rumors and everyone was interested in the news - no one had heard of such an occurrence in years...

"Isn't that awful?" I offered.
"Yeah" he moved his finger quickly down the sentences, "she was a distant relative of mine."
I thought about the care I should take with my words. Nothing to strident, nothing to disregarding.
"Oh, I'm sorry to hear that."
He got up and handed the paper back to me, I forgot if he said 'thank you' or another 'yeah', he just turned around and headed back to the car and left.

I went back into the manager's unit and thought about my safety - I got a buck knife out of the kitchen drawer and set it next to the front door. I slept with it by my side that night, the front doors locked, the bedroom locked, the windows closed and locked on a 98-degree day.

The rest of the weekend was delightful: family came in to do some remodeling, some friends in for a little R&R on Friday. The great thing about Minam is that we really know how to have a good time: country drives, a little sauce and some music, some time by a fire telling fish-stories, good food, and good conversation. There is a welcoming aura there at the confluence of the two rivers, a feeling that you are free to enjoy time as you please, and we encourage those who visit Minam to do just that. After a fun weekend, everyone skirted out on Sunday and once again, I was alone in the canyon.

I went to bed on Sunday at 2:30am, anxious at being alone, and woke up to my mother calling on Monday around 8am. "They released a picture of the killer, Chels. I want you to get a good look at him."
By this time the news broke that there were three victims total, people in the county were so certain there was a serial killer on the loose that the police had to release a statement dispelling the rumors. There was also rumors of a head found in a backpack. Also not true. I wasn't reading the paper that was being delivered daily to the motel, I was only quickly glancing to see whether or not that murderer had been captured. In Saturday's paper there were three pictures - two of people in plain clothes and one of a young man in a mug shot. I figured that was their prime suspect and moved on with my day.
"Yeah mom," I said yawning, "I already saw the guy. I haven't seen him."
"Okay, well, I just want you to be careful."
She headed off the work and since I was awakened by the phone call, I was up. I turned on the news anyway to get a good look at the guy and to make sure I knew his face. And this is probably no surprise to any reader of true-crime, but when his face came up on the news I nearly fell off the bed: my first visitor on Thursday was the guy.

I called my mom - or at least tried to - to ask her what to do. Should I call the police since the guy is still on the loose? She wasn't there to ask.
I decided to call the Union County Police.
A 1/2 hour later the news broke that Gregory A. Cook was captured in Rainier, Washington.In a news report he confessed and apologized.

Although I am scared of the dark and the dark is where most of the "bad" things that have happened to me have occurred, it's no stretch to say that frightening things happen in broad daylight - and often within a mile of home.

Minam is not where I reside, but it is one of my homes.
Even though we fondly call it The Minam Asylum.

Is Feminism Obsolete?

In this video forwarded to me by my friend Rebecca Rod, republican strategist, Mary Matalin can't even say "feminism," she stalls every time before she utters the words, which doesn't surprise me, even though she says the feminism she once fought for in the 60s has been perverted over the years. Perverted? By whom? By what?

While I stand behind Palin defending her daughters (what mother wouldn't defend their daughters from nationally broadcast comment like that), I also balked at her for saying that it's a matter women's rights. Pft. Whatever Palin... Like women's rights are on the forefront of your mind. Whatever bus you want to ride...

But I eat my words...Like Jessica Valenti at feministing.com, a philosophy of feminism professor once told me that a feminist is someone who designates themselves as one, or someone else who designates another as one. So is it any surprise that the word "feminism" is convoluted, and doesn't have the same meaning as it did in the 60s or 70s? Because, as feminists, we have so many issues that matter to us, we have so many agendas, that it only seems the word is "obsolete."

But it's not. It wasn't lost in 2004 when The March for Women's Lives drew over a million people. I believe that today feminists are more widely spread. From the people who are returning to more domesticated ways of living and staying home with their families, to the people on campuses programming and bringing awareness to student communities, to separatists who are still working the land and maintaining women's communes, to queers working on trans issues, to people of all genders continuing to work on abortion rights, to women seeking equality in the military, to the men and gender benders who stand behind our cause and walk with us at marches...

Feminism isn't "obsolete," unless you are only paying attention to national media..

But if Tina Brown thinks Hillary Clinton is real female power and Naomi Wolf thinks Angelina Jolie is the "embodiment of female power and liberation," I wonder what other public figures we can point to that demonstrate the diversity of feminist activist who continue to demonstrate "real" female power. Why not bell hooks? Isn't she still writing, still speaking out, still working for the cause? What about Gloria Steinem? Is she not longer relevant because she of her age, or her married status? What about the men who work for the feminist agenda, wouldn't Cornell West consider himself a feminist? And one of my favorite people to reflect on, Phillis Schlafly, I might even point to and call a feminist even though she would never call herself one, and was nearly the antithesis of feminism in the 60s and 70s. But wouldn't she fall in line with some of our feminists today?

I care about being a feminist, but I wonder if we should consider the questions posed by CNN reporter, Carol Costello. Why care about being a feminist anymore? If everyone has their own definition of feminism, why even use the word?

And finally, has feminism really become an exclusive club?

A Controlled Burn

The hardest part of negotiating a relationship with my other mother is determining whether or not she is of sound enough mind to maintain contact.

We haven't spoken to one another since before Christmas when I decided that her schizophrenia combined with drug and alcohol usage was effecting her ability to have coherent conversations with me. Also, after several phone calls that pursued the same line of questioning about my mother I felt as if her intentions for remaining in touch with me were not so much about our relationship, but with the desire maintain a thin line of contact with my mother. Just in case. And maybe that is her reason for remaining in touch with me - I am the last thread that connects her to a life she cannot recover, the one life in which she felt she really lived.

And maybe I keep in touch with her for my own reasons. She is a part of my connection to an identity: daughter of lesbians. And I keep in touch with her because I worry that she has no one, or few people, in her life that support her and love her unconditionally. Though, I am not even sure I love her unconditionally anymore. My psychological and emotional state is valuable to me and cannot afford to teeter any closer to the line where I could potentially break down and give into confusion. I've already been there and know what it takes to get out. I don't have time.

I also keep in touch with her out of guilt. I am her daughter. Her only daughter, as her biological daughter with whom she adopted out at birth, fled the relationship after meeting her in person for the first time, and has not kept in touch with her after seeing her physical and mental state several Christmases ago. Maybe she too closely saw what she could turn into and ran for her life. Sometimes I wonder if I should also run.

She called me few days ago after receiving the news that my grandfather passed through her brother whom my mother emailed to relay the message, and her voice mail plead for a phone call if it was in fact true. I considered it for days and finally called today to confirm her suspicion. Our conversation was short, she told me to give her condolences to my grandmother and my mother, and she told me that demons chased her from her apartment and I understood how that could happen, and she told me that she should write down her history so that I could write about - that there was so much to talk about, and she said that she had taken up painting again and this was a surprise to me because the only art I'd seen her do was during her times of institutionalization. But she laughed, she didn't mean she was using paint - she meant she had been smearing her own feces on the walls.

"Ew" I said instinctively and without thinking. And I had already said it when I realized there was a more appropriate response that should've come from my mouth. I could only ask about her meds, if she had been to the doctor lately, if she was ok.

She rarely tells me that she's anything but ok.
She's not ok.
She hasn't been for a long time.

Sometimes the mind snaps and the mind deteriorates before your eyes, as out of control as a brush fire in August. And sometimes the deterioration of the mind is slow and steady as a controlled burn, ever square inch of the minds land charred. Both fires have the capacity to spread flames onto the lands around them, and I often find myself fighting a fire which I allowed to ignite.

I rarely tell anyone I am anything but ok.
I'm also not ok.
I haven't been for a long time.

But I still have my mind.

The Rising Tide of White

Every morning I look in the mirror and find a razor-gray stripes highlighting my round face. They are prolific little buggers and I've given up trying to control them. It wasn't that I was trying to control them really, what I was trying to control was the red-ended grow out that is the last twenties years of my hair dying experimentation. My reasons for attempting to modify my dye-crazy behavior and let the gray grow out is due, in part, to watching my mother's hair grow, dye, and be cut. The two of us have been dying our hair a nice rusty auburn color for so long that people assume we are natural reddish-heads. Because of this, we've been unable to see the slow transition of our dark-ash-brown crowns turning to sterling. Catch my mother in a lull between dye-jobs and you'll find she has a white halo around her face and down her skull that spreads a few inches, as if Moses himself was parting the supermarket Red-Sea. By gauging the clone-like similarities between my mother and I, the decision was made to grow out the dye now and face aging head on (or at least on my head).

At 51, if you eek a peek under the red cloak, at the base of my mother's roots, you will see that her hair is a shiny white with a few stray brown survivors holding on for their lives. My hair, now down to my waist, is a result of nearly eight years of growing my hair out. From the skull, the first 5-6 inches is my natural color, the rest is curly, over-processed, reddish-brownish, what stylists without the right descriptive words call "ethnic-like" hair. Since we all have an ethnic heritage, I guess it's safe to assume that I got this hair from the smattering of god-knows-what European heritages with which I am composed. People more familiar with Irish folk will tell me that is where my curly coarse hair comes from. And the like for the Italian side of me. But there is that long lost branch of my heritage which remains a mystery. All I have is picture of the man who would've been my biological grandfather had he not passed in a plane crash when my mother was four, and a hazy memory of my great grandparents Zefa and Jesse Jones, both of who were blazing white-haired folk who passed long before I could ask them questions about that side of the family. All I knew is that Zefa made her way to Oregon on a wagon-train. The memory of sitting at her feet while she rocked in a chair telling me the story, is something I believe I made up. Maybe after my mom relayed the story to me herself.

Without knowing the heritage of that branch of my family, I am also not privy a great deal of additional knowledge. I know there are some Jones family in the SF are, but my curiosity hasn't compelled me to go dig through public records to find out more about this, as of now, fictitious family. Particularly since I've heard that a certain woman was brazen enough to say "Oh, bullshit" at a funeral my mother attended for her late uncle when the read the list of survivors and included her a a niece. Maybe I don't need to get to know the Jones family after all...

And I look at my grandmother, a Sparks, and see that it took here a long time to grow in the gray. And I look at my Dad who's 52 and see that he's just starting to brighten up a bit above the brow. His parents went gray - but not until much later - so I am sure that I am more Jones than I can ever imagine, though I can only look into the eyes of my mother and see her father's and see his mother's eyes and realize that not only do my eyes droop in the corners as they do, but that my hair might be one of the only living Jones histories with which I am able to have tactile contact.

In the mornings is when I touch it, feel it, get close to the mirror and examine the prism of light that passes through the hair and wonder how long it will take me to rid myself of the awful red-dyed ends hanging from my head, or how quickly I will turn platinum like my mother, my great-grand-mother, and if I will coil my hair in a bun as she did, or if I will find my way back to the dye and try to reclaim my youth for 11.59 in the beauty products aisle. Or maybe I will just love the hell out of this hair, all these stray grays that my ex individually points out while saying her name. And though they say that we don't go gray because of stress, even though we now know it's a chemical reaction that comes from the inside and works it's way out, these gray hairs are all bricks through the pathway that is my life.

So I'm gonna let them grow. Because although it's been a crazy ride, and a helluva journey, I'm ready (for now) to recognize that it's all been worth the slow rising tide of white upon my head.

Many Means of Expression

On a day like this, how can one not have something to say?

There are many political goings-on that have moved me to tears over the past eight years:

• My family called from Canada the night before I voted. They left messages on my voice mail saying, "We are just calling to remind you to vote for Gore." But, President George W. Bush's election in 2000 was not one of the events that caused me tears; quite the contrary, I was infuriated. But at that point, I was still too young and far too self consumed too think much of his election other than a halfhearted, "Well, it's the end of the world" or "it's certain we'll go to war with him in the White House."

• There were tears of unhinged fear upon seeing the World Trade Center's twin towers fall along with so many people. There was a voice mail from a friend in Brooklyn with whom I had spent a long evening under the towers, just three days earlier. He said, "Chelsia. Oh mah gawd. I'm fine, but I am standing on Carol Street and there are pencils falling from the sky." And the line went dead.
  

• March 20th, 2003. 12 a.m. PST. In bed, beside my girlfriend. We held each other, crying, talking, fearful that our president was keeping his promise and dropping bombs on villages in Afghanistan. We asked each other, "Do you really think he'll do it?" We looked at the walls of her basement and imagined Children asleep in houses made of clay, thousands of miles away. We fell asleep with our eyes wet and when we woke the next morning we protested with 30-thousand others in the streets of Portland.

• Then, the "mis-election" of President George W. Bush defeated me in 2004 and put me to bed early. My tears, that day, were for my the failure of my state (Oregon) to support equal rights for GLBT families when they decidedly passed of a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. I had worked so hard that year for equal rights for my family of origin and for my relationship and those of my chosen family and community. And o top it all of, my country reelected a man I was sure would bring down not only our country, but many others.

• April 24th, 2004. Tears again. When I walked onto the National Mall and saw 1.5 million other people present in defense of women's rights to privacy and choice. I cried at the magnitude of people who showed up in D.C. at what was called the largest march on Washington for women's rights, ever. And that I was so privileged to attend with the gracious support from the students and faculty from my community college to get me there. It was there that I heard Senator Hillary Clinton speak. It was that march that, I believe, caused Dick Cheney to withdraw his request for the medical records of women in the US who had had abortions. It was a small victory, but an important one.
  

Today and last night, off and on, I've released a few tears, mostly of joy, for the achievements of the incoming administration and the men and women of our country who fought for so long prior to this moment; for those who died, who wrote and sang and marched in the streets so that our country could elect a President of color. And on this day, (I hate to use such a cliche' campaign slogan but...) I am filled with such hope that gains will be made for equality in all of the spectrum of community in this country; be it that of race, nationality, religion, socio-economic status, political affiliation, sexual orientation, gender, ability, age, and any other identity included. I feel as if opportunity has broadened for many and that a new spirit may prevail, if we allow it so. I believe that spirit is that of Love.

I can't help but think of my sisters on a day like this. One 13 and the other 11. Although this may be somewhat only interesting to them, I hope they someday understand the importance of this day in the history of this nation. I hope that our world and that the people of this nation demonstrate the recognition, accountability, and responsibility President Barack Obama asked us to dutifully undertake for the sake of future generations.

When I was in Jr. High School, there was a blip in time where I became aware of international politics. My mothers recorded the news that broadcast the firing of artillery through night vision. Little green dots flew through the air in all directions and explosions erupted on the horizon as the newscasters detailed what was happening to a entranced audience. Although we didn't know the ins and outs of Desert Storm, we knew war was wrong and therefore, protested by walking out of school and having a sit-in on the grassy field at Rowe Jr. High School. We sat for a while and then the administrators pulled us back in. Unfortunately, I didn't become aware of politics again, or the impact of national politics, until long after I left high school.

I was awakened by the Seattle WTO protests and Y2K. It was then that I realized how much each of us is woven into the power of the larger systems this country and this world. It was then that I realized I couldn't afford to not pay attention.

But I haven't been paying much attention and I haven't been working for the last three years. I've been disheartened, angry, self-involved, unable to look, and I simply turned the channel. I can afford to do work and maybe I should have been doing work all along. But I believe that change occurs no matter how small of a change you make or no matter how few hear your voice.

Today President Obama said, "...your people will judge you on what you can build, and not what you destroy." And although he directed this remark to the leaders of countries in conflict, I believe it is a message we should all hear. No matter how small you think your impact is, lets build instead of destroy, love instead of hate, have hope instead of fear, and go forward in the spirit of building a better world and community that will sustain for many generations to come.

Does My Hair Make My Ass Look Big?

Weight: 155 / BMI: 26% / Height: 5'6" / Target Weight: 137-145

This is what the internet tells me as I click through site after site of weigh loss advice.
Oh, there is no lack of information on the web for how to get your skinny on.
The problem, no one is getting skinnier by sitting on their ass at the keyboard.
Some people want to get slimmer, some people want to gain weight, and a very few and select special people love their body just the way it is.
That's right, they are the special ones.
Realistically, I know there isn't any reason for me to lose weight except for my own desire to get in shape and trim up or whatever my newest body ambition turns out to be.
At this point, I am relatively comfortable with my body.
80% comfortable. That's a pretty good number.

But I believe most women aren't happy with their body (I'll not be sexist and say that a majority of men aren't satisfied as well). But this is about women in particular. At one time or another most every woman with which I've had a conversation talks about their weight. Some in a very direct way, "Oh, I've gotten fat since...(insert minor traumatic or life changing experience here)" or "I've lost so much weight since...(insert minor traumatic or life changing experience here)." Some ladies go about it in a very round-about way, "I've stopped eating wheat and sugar, and drinking. And I feel great!" (An apology for my composite characterization of a few select friends). Some in a very understated way, "I just don't feel like myself anymore." I like to think I avoid conversations about weight with my people because it's a conversation that has become as casual as, "How's the weather out there." It's a conversation that doesn't necessarily need to happen. I really want to know about you as a person, not the size of your ass or your muffin top.

So, I try (and I emphasize try) to avoid the weight conversation because I think we women obsess and ultimately damage our confidence and self-esteem when we talk about our weight. There are far too many people in the world with eating disorders that are so consuming they become life threatening. Once upon a time (earlier this year), I teetered on the edge of Bulimia when I found myself eating so much my stomach would ache - so I would purge afterward and found it was the best possible solution to ease the bloating. For those of you who haven't engaged in repeititve self-induced puking, I am here to tell you that after a while of forcing yourself to puke, it gets real easy to do it over again despite the fact that you consider the acidity taking the enamel right off your teeth and a myriad of other health issues associated with the process as you tickle the back of your throat and proceed to fill up the porcelain bowl.
I'm beyond this stint at this point in my life, likely because these days I am happier.

Anyway, I am far less concerned with the weight of other people than I am my own. The women in my family, at least the generation ahead of me, are always on diets and because of this I am always worried my ass is going to get big and I will have no control over it. About once a week I say to myself, "I want to start running now that I've quit smoking (almost 5 months now)," usually after I eat dinner and desert and watch The Biggest Loser. I say to myself, "If only I had a trainer like Jillian to yell at me, or a treadmill in my living room, or the ability to put my laptop in the book holder of the elliptical machine at the gym, or if I had better shoes, or an Ipod holder, and some Mace, and if the sun didn't go down so early, then I would run."

Boy... Turns out it takes a lot for me to get my ass up and exercise.

This is what I've found in my life-long search for the right exercise program:

1. I hate: Yoga (what kind of liberal hates Yoga: the new-age spiritual exercise of choice).
2. I can run but it takes a while to do a mile without stopping. When I finally reach that goal I go back to letting my imagination run instead of my feet.
3. The pool is the best place for me to exercise and meditate at once. I don't care that my ass looks bigger in a bathing suit. The problem: it does nothing for the slimming of my ass-tree-trunk-kankle-legs.
   
4. I have to do the elliptical in the student rec. center - usually within eye-shot of a student who is gliding away, all 105 lbs of them, as I push buttons frantically trying to figure out how to start a program.
   

Now there are other methods for losing weight that don't involve exercise and this is what I've learned from those excursions:

1. Meth or any form of amphetamine is a quick way to drop the pounds. But like the commercials depict, you will pick every pore on your body, be gross, have awesome (in the not so awesome sense) Kate Moss like black circles under your eyes, and your new found community will likely take more away from you than your weight.
2. Break ups and divorces. Nothing is better for my figure than heartache, loneliness, and a general dislike of myself. I lose my appetite, drink more, stay up late, and go out too often, all in effort to keep myself busy and all the while the deep pit in my stomach helps me to get my skinny on.
   
3. I love dancing. Throughout my life, my commitment to shaking my ass on the dance floor has been in flux. I spent my late teens at the underage night club and various all night Raves. My early twenties in the bars and a few clubs, my mid-twenties at queer nights and then came my late twenties and thirties - and I lost all my enthusiasm for second-hand smoke and hangovers.
   

With all this in mind, I believe the time has come for me to get in shape again. I am going to fore go all the methods of weight loss that don't involve exercise and try to go to the gym and do it the hard way. But I would like to make a couple of suggestions to the community at large in order to help us all be a little more in shape and a little less concerned with our bodies.

1. Can we bring the portion sizes down a tid-bit. Christ people, no one needs to eat that much.
   
2. I wanna see more "fat" girls in advertisements. You know, women that reflect my own body type so I can be reminded that I'm not, god forbid (cyber-sarcasm here), a "big girl" (all 5'6" / 155 lbs of me - a whole twenty pounds heavier than I was in Jr. High School (and last year for a few weeks, but lets not go there again)).
3. And can we make exercise "fun" and cool again? For instance, Jazzercise sounds like so much fun - but no one has been brave enough to resurrect this lost exercise program of the 80s. Boy, it's really too bad. I have my leotard ready and everything. Besides, when the current fad passes, it will be a great way to put those leg warmers to good use.

For now, I am going to put my laptop to rest and shut off the light and hope that tomorrow I get up in time to go to school, change, and with my Ipod recharged and my tennis shoes in hand, and my fingers fumbling with the freaking buttons on the elliptical machine, get a freaking workout.

Gay Purgatory

Mr. Williamson, my high school biology teacher, made his position on homosexuality clear. He posted "Yes on Measure 9" propaganda all over his desk: bumper stickers, fliers, signs, etc. He wore a button on his suspenders, which cuddled the sides of his round belly, everyday. He turned on Rush Limbaugh and let him rattle away his conservative values while we worked away at our labs three days a week.

I sat at a table with four people who I remember very distinctly: three who, although they couldn't yet vote, were against Measure 9 (including myself), and one who was for it. I don't know if my table mates knew my mothers were gay and had been together, by that time, nearly 13 years. I certainly didn't out us. Maybe the mask I'd put on for the world was so affixed that not even I wanted to admit to myself that my parents were gay.

I'm not a unicorn. There are kids all over this world; biological, adopted, fostered, or otherwise; who have parents, aunties, uncles, cousins, or grandparents who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transexual, transgendered, or queer. And they're not going away. And they will remain both out and faceless. The will not be heard from, they may not be asked or they may not speak out. The will need to be protected and they will need to be consoled. They will not understand and they will understand very clearly what the consequences of hate has upon their families.

I was once one of those kids. Now, I am one of those adults who endured a lifetime barrage of anti-gay legislation. There have been many in my time: Measure 8, Measure 36, Measure 13, Prop 8, and so many more I can't recall, and so many more to come.

Today, with the passage of California's Prop. 8, I can't help but consider so many things. To a degree, I am still closeted, blog and all. I am in Idaho and although my peers here are my allies, I am still afraid and careful of how much I am visible. How much can I be visible in the Idaho collegiate system? How can I be an advocate for my students who are in the process of developing their own identity? How can I be an activist in this community and be safe? How safe can I be when my partner is in town for a visit?

I am in gay purgatory, and have always been. Somewhere between being out but not being identifiable. Pass me on the street and you would never know I had gay parents or that I myself, identify as queer. And although I've sat before rooms full of people at city hall, at conferences, in colleges, and community meetings, I am still hesitant to engage people in conversations about gay rights. I know people sit at their desks reading the news about protests in California and roll their eyes? "Well, the people have spoken and you have to accept that." I've heard the apathy from our own community, "Oh well, it's been this way for a long time." I know both of these responses because I've responded the same.

Yes. It's been this way for a long time. Ballot measure comes up, gay rights come into question, and measure passes. We are used to defeat and elated by scraps of separate-but-not-equal rights we get.

Rights? These are the rights I have: I have the right to look over my shoulders in public, before I give my partner a good-bye kiss on the lips. I have the right to consider my vacation destinations because my partner and I could be killed in state parks while camping, in small towns as we leave the bar, on hiking trails, in our own town, and in foreign nations across the globe. I have the right to hide my identity from my landlords for fear that my relationship will have my lose my housing. I have the right to hesitantly hold hands in public. I have the right to determine what actions may cause me and my partner to be gay bashed. I have the right to fear small towns and rural communities. I have the right to be unionized or partnered in counties or states but as soon as I cross the state-line, lose that recognition. I have the right to, god forbid something happens while we are together, be separated from my partner in an emergency room because we are not family.

I am tired. I am sad. And I am fucking angry.

The View From Here.

When I woke up a half hour ago, my eyes were dry from the pumpkin beer I shared with friends last night. They were dry from staying up too late trying to beat one of my peers in a game of Wordtwister on Facebook. My eyes were dry because, although it rained last night, I now live in the Inland Northwest where we've seen a deliciously crisp and dry run of fall days. It's the season of dark, both in the morning and night.

I didn't want to get up. My eyes could not get wet. I blinked. And blinked.

My warm and soft little wiener dog curled up next to my hand and I rubbed her belly. My phone went off and my girlfriend sent a text message from Portland: Wish you were here.
Me too. I replied.

NPR was blaring from my bedside (an unreasonable volume for 6 AM) and Lakshmi Singh was saying People are lined up in Carson, Nevada where the polls have just opened.

It's a big day. I thought to myself.
And in an instant I was overcome with emotion and for just a second my bleeding liberal heart took a few deep pumps in my chest and I wept.

I know better than to put a moment of tears or crying into my writing. It's an action that needs to be written with a delicate hand (or typing since this is 2008). But since this is a blog and well, I don't filter and revise much here, I am going to tell you how it is and how it happens.

It was maybe three tears. Just three.

From 2001 to 2006, I fought the good fight. I was in the streets the day Bush decided to drop bombs on Afghanistan and Iraq with my best friend. We stayed in the streets until night fell. We blocked the freeways to demonstrate our need to stop our dependence on foreign oil. I sat in on anarcho-feminist meetings with friends and other revolutionary minded individuals and we looked at ways to serve disadvantaged populations in Portland. I worked in the Women's Resource Center with a group of women and we served women and men who were sexually assaulted, needed housing, support, education, supplies, food, resources of all kinds. We fought oppression in all forms. We called each other out on our shit. We had discussions about queer identity and the role of feminism in just about anything you can imagine. We educated. I spoke to people about being raised by lesbian mothers and how anti-gay legislation effected our household and my mind. I was out and fighting against Measure 36, the Oregon Constitutional Amendment to Ban Same-sex Marriage. I was anti-Bush and truly wanted Dennis Kucinnich in office ( a long shot) but voted for Kerry anyway. I sat before the television that night and watched as Bush, again, took office.

How could it be? I thought. All this work. All these people. This war. How could this happen?
And then I watched Oregon vote for the constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage and I couldn't believe my ears, my eyes. My state. My blue state. My liberal enclave on the West coast. Voted no for families like mine. For relationships like mine. For equality.

And I quit a certain kind of fighting that I had been doing for so long. I stopped being involved with politics and started talking to people and having conversations. I lost my faith in democracy. I still don't believe a true democracy exists here and I'm not sure it ever has or will. There is too little we, the American people, know.
So when the hype for this election started some 2 years ago, my enthusiasm was already lost. My will to fight, the get excited, to be involved dissolved with my state's, my nation's, inability to include me and my family (given and chosen) as an equal member or this society. I had it.

I felt a moment of exhilaration when I put my ballot in the mail and sent it back to Oregon.
And this morning, I felt another moment when I realized that no matter who is elected today, as cliche and repetitious as this is, history will be made.
And this is when my eyes got wet.
Provided that Obama (likely) takes office, we will have breached the rein of white-supremacy in our highest office. And if Obama takes office I believe I will feel a collective sigh come like a wave across the oceans, from the furthest reaches of the globe. To me, having Obama elected is asking the world to give Americans another chance. We don't want to be stereotyped as gluttonous consumers of the world resources, disregarding of our pacts with allies, our-way-or-the-highway war mongers.

We want a chance to show you another side of the American people.

And I get to be a part of it. My vote (hopefully) counts. That bottle of Champagne in my fridge might finally be opened because there may be a real reason to crack it. I might go dance in the streets of Moscow in the company of my friends and professor and students here in Idaho. I may...

But because I've been excited before, because I had hope and dreams, because I fought with all my intellectual strength and stood on my feet through the night and stood up against the police blockades and sat in meetings and protest Bush and worked hard for my community and STILL I was denied and STILL I watched my community both small and wide, denied. Still there is a chance I will, we will, be denied again.

And so, I put on my work clothes. I sit at my kitchen table with my laptop. I start writing my paper that is due at noon and I look out the window and see that although the world could change, the view may be the same.

Or the view could change and the world will never be the same.