Quodlibets

Lions and Tigers and Lesbos, Oh My!

Annie on My Mind is an outdated story about two girls who fall in love.  Liza is a private school girl who meets Annie at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and is immediately taken in by her fanciful pretend play, even though it seems babyish for girls their age.  The two girls become fast friends, and are quickly moving down a road that makes Liza nervous.  But she doesn't pull away when they kiss.  When the kiss is over, Liza is confused, scared, and most of all, filled with happy feelings about Annie.  And even though she'd like to forget this has ever happened, she just can't.  She and Annie embark on a relationship--a relationship that they both know is taboo, but that Annie has come to accept in a way Liza has not.  The girls eventually, after much discussion, begin to be sexually active, and that's when things get tangled up.  The girls are discovered, and Liza is brought up for discipline by her private school.

I didn't hate this book.  I didn't love it, either, but I would say the good outweighs the bad.  I can certainly understand why it's challenged all the time.  Lesbians?  In high school?  Having sex?  Um, yeah, that hits all the points.  In some ways, you don't even need to read this book to understand why parents challenge it.  And I'd bet you any money that people who challenge this book do it without reading it.  Still, unlike books banned for language or (hetero) sex, there is always going to be a segment of the population that will challenge books like this, because there are gay people, and *gasp*, they don't rehabilitate by the end of the book.  However, I will say that because this was written in the 80's, being gay isn't presented as something that's normal, or something that's necessarily going to be treated as normal.  The older gay couple that acts as sort of parallel to Annie and Liza's relationship ultimately lose their jobs because their homosexuality is discovered, and teachers can't be gay.  I'm not saying those consequences don't exist now, but I do think things are slightly better now. 

I don't think this book is a bad thing to have on a library shelf, and while it's not the first book I would recommend to a teen reader who thinks she might be gay, I bet that most teens who are confused or questioning or worried would want to read voraciously on the topic, and this book is certainly not something I wouldn't give a teen.  It definitely does a good job of describing the feelings, physical and emotional, that Annie and Liza have for one another.  It's a good account of what it's like to fall in love--and to fall in love with a girl. 

All in all, worth reading.  And a good start to banned books week.

It's been a long time

With apologies to frog, because we clearly do not go the same sort of concerts.  Copy this list; leave in the bands you've seen perform live; delete the ones you haven't, and add new ones that you have seen until you reach 25. An asterisk means the previous person had it on their list. Two asterisks means the last two people who did this before you had that band on their list.  Found at frogblog.  And here goes.

ani difranco**
Indigo Girls*
Dar Williams*
Dave Matthews Band
REM
Pearl Jam
Counting Crows
Rilo Kiley
Kings of Leon
My Morning Jacket
Sufjan Stevens
Barbra Streisand
Michael Buble
Paul McCartney
Eric Clapton
Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young
Neil Young
Roger Waters
Pete Yorn
Keane
The Kooks
Dixie Chicks
Death Cab for Cutie
The Police
Beth Orton

Actually, this is very easy for me, because I've got a handy-dandy Excel spreadsheet that lists every concert I've ever been to (that I could remember when I started making the list).  87 currently.

I'm sick of everything

It's one of those sorts of misanthropic days.  I actually am really enjoying the book I started last night, but I don't want to read it, dammit.  And I don't want to do crossword puzzles, which of course is my go-to bored-at-work activity.  I feel like complaining too, and I can't tell you why, as I seemingly have absolutely nothing to complain about.  It's a four-day week, I'm headed for donuts and Little Bavaria, Michigan on Friday, and I still just want to sit on the couch and bitch. 

It's getting so dire I'm thinking about buying a beret and smoking Gauloises while drinking copious amounts of red wine in a Bistro.  And then I would of course have to purse my lips and say, "You people make my ass twitch" in an atrocious French accent. 

Yes, I'm in a bad mood.  When I think about eating the lunch I brought to work, I feel sad.  When I think about going off-campus to get food, I get even sadder, because the parking situation here is insane.  When I think about working the reference desk, I feel mad, but when I think about just sitting at my desk feeling infused with a sense of ennui, I also feel mad.  I'd walk over to the public at lunch, but then I'd be out in the heat.  And I'm wearing a cardigan that absolutely must stay on.  So no public. 

Also, I have to pee but really don't feel like dealing with that in the least.  I mean, the bathroom on this floor is a pain in the ass because the lock barely works, and yet if you don't lock it (which is my only chance of getting out of it in a timely fashion; otherwise, I'll struggle with the lock for 10 minutes and frustratedly begin to cry.  Not that that's happened before or anything.), people get mad at you.  There's a stall in the bathroom, people!  You're not going to see my snatch if you walk in there.  But no, it's some major breach of etiquette to not lock, which means I have to trek downstairs and use that bathroom, and that feels like too much effort right now.

Ok, I have to go watch the desk.  Grrrr.

Little Pleasure

The headline in the Tribune this morning was "He moves like a couch".  Don't you think that says it all?

The Bears suck.  If they hadn't been playing my quarterback, I might be more depressed than I am right now.  As it was, I went into this season with very muted expectations, and apparently, that was not a bad decision.

Also, I do not like Cedric Benson, and it looks to me we're in bad shape next season, seeing as we'll be needing a new quarterback, a new running back, and a younger offensive line.  Welcome to mediocrity, Chicago!

That is all.

Observation

Here's another reason I'm an old lady:  every night after dinner I have to eat my Viactiv caramel calcium chew.  Yes, you read that right.  Viactiv calcium chews.  It's only a matter of time before I start buying orthopedic shoes in hideous murky brown and wearing my sunglasses around my neck on a beaded chain.  Also, I'll be sporting a blue rinse next time you see me.

In all seriousness, though, my gynecologist fairly insisted that I add a calcium supplement to my diet because at my age, my bones are still adding density, and need calcium to do it.  I'm interested in not breaking when I'm 60, so I decided to take her advice.

However, this does not make me feel any younger.

Show

We were wrong.  My friend Tim and I had a discussion about Ani, and decided she was past her prime.  That it wouldn't be very enjoyable to see her.  That it would be like the old days.  And, granted, it wasn't like the old days.  Nothing could quite be that Ani.  But it was damn close.  She played "Dilate" and "Overlap" and she sounded good.  And there was a band!  A band, a band, a band with a stand-up bass and a drummer and oh the glory of it all.  I still don't like Ani's new music, and possibly never will buy an album of hers again, but when she sang the old songs, she sounded better than she has the last few times I saw her.  So thanks for the ticket, Rita, and I'm sorry I cursed the seats.

See, yeah, the seats were awesome.  But the people in front of us?  Worst.  People.  Ever.  At.  A. Show.  I do not exaggerate one bit; ask Rita.  I almost called this post Molester Molesting, but I decided that definitely gave the wrong picture, in general.  First of all, the three people in front of us were drunk.  And still drinking when we got there.  Drinking a lot.  It was two girls and a guy.  He sat in between them.  During the first act (Melissa Ferrick) he made fun of the music, and talked loudly to the blond chick.  Talked LOUDLY.  He wasn't talking about the music, but just chatting in general.  The other chick with him shushed him a few times, but he didn't listen, because hello?  He wasn't there for the music.  His dumb blond chick girlfriend dragged him.  They were a couple, I assume, because he was sort of all over her.  Things got worse during Ani; he talked loudly through most of the concert, but towards the end, he was louder and more insistent.  I'm sure he was bored.  Whatever.  Then, he started feeling on his girlfriend.  And then, he started feeling on the other girl.  I mean, grabbing her butt, all kinds of stuff like that.  At one point, she grabbed his hand off her ass and held it as she danced, so as to stop him from the molesting.  It was so fucking gross.  Then he started dirty dancing with the girlfriend (corollary:  he thought he was god's gift, it was apparent), and I'm surprised he didn't whip it out and do her right there.  I did hear him say, at one point, that they were gonna go home and "DO IT AFTER THE SHOW".  That's how loud he was.  After the dirty dancing, he went back to molesting the friend.  I mean, for fuck's sake, who the hell dates a guy that molests their friends?

Listen, ladies.  If your man can't behave himself at a show he doesn't want to be at, please do not bring him to the show.  Leave him at home.  Please.  Pretty please?  Because whoever those people are, they ought to be ashamed of how this man acted.  He was a boor and a sexual harasser, and it's shameful and embarrassing.  And it ruined the show for a number of people, because he wasn't just getting dirty looks from Rita and I.  I honestly cannot imagine what makes someone think that just because they don't enjoy the music at a show they can disrespect the artist and all the other people who paid a lot of money for their seats.  What a total asshole.

At least the show was good.

Putting it into words

I read Dooce mostly to laugh.  Doesn't everyone?  Heather's posts about life with Jon and Leta are brilliantly funny.  But sometimes, when Dooce gets serious, I remember why the internets really loves her.  There is an honesty about Heather that hits you right between the eyes, in a good way.  And I don't know about other women, but sometimes, I feel like she is speaking for me. Today's post is one of those. 

I obviously don't have kids, and I've also been pretty clear on the fact that I don't want them.  But actually, I waver.  Every great once in a while, I imagine what it might be like to have a child.  And the truth is, I can't see myself doing mommy things.  I can't see being anything but impatient with a baby, even in my imaginings.  I won't apologize for it, because at least I'm not intending to go into motherhood thinking this.  The only way I could consent to having a child is if I could somehow get past this sense of things.  I can't see getting there, though.  I don't remember if Heather ever talked about wanting a baby, or the lead-up to the pregnancy.  So I don't know if she felt like this, or if Leta was highly anticipated, and the schism in Heather's head about being a mommy was a shock at birth.  But I imagine it's the second, and that's different from how I feel, and I know it.  I don't think my situation is anything like Heather's, honestly.  I already know that I could never stay home with a kid.  I already know that I wouldn't be the kind of mommy that wanted only to be with her child.  I don't think I'd have to spend time accepting that my motherhood would be different from the traditional view of it.  I already know it would.  I accept that. 

The thing I don't know, and the thing that will absolutely prevent me from having a child until I figure it out, is if I could be anything but indifferent towards the idea.  I certainly feel no great passion for it.  Sometimes I find reasons that I think are good--my mom would be the cutest grandma ever, the world needs more children of intelligent liberal parents--and I realize that these reasons aren't good at all.  The most important reason, feeling a desire to parent, is utterly lacking within me.  I joke with Sam about it, how he can stay home with the kid and do all the (traditionally) mommy stuff and I'll come in at the end of the day and kiss the kid before it goes to bed.  It's a horrific thing to condemn a kid to, a parent so uninvolved with their life, and I can't help feeling that that's where we'll eventually end up if we have a child, because I simply have no interest in that stuff. 

Before you all yell at me that it changes when it's your own kids and blah blah blah, you'll love your kid so much all that stuff will go away and you'll love holding your screaming baby and it all makes it worth it, and you know, all that shit, stop and think for a minute if you think every woman who has children is happy that she did.  We are not all the same, just because we're women and possess uteri, and so can you not admit that there might be women who in fact do not organically want children?  And that it might be a mistake for women who are lukewarm about the prospect to go through with it because they are women, and that is what they are supposed to do?  I'm not going to give you a name, but a woman I know recently told me that if she had to do it over, no matter that she loves her children more than herself and that she would give her life for them (they're grown now), she wouldn't have had children.  She did it because it was the 70's and women were wives and mothers in the 70's, and there was no space in her head that allowed her to be childless.  She said she never did enjoy being a mother, never enjoyed the playgroups and the relentless drive to care for the children.  And she stressed that she did love her kids, and felt like they enriched her life, but still.  She wasn't meant for it, and she said she knew that now.

I think I'm that woman.  I think that for the first time, ever, women are allowing themselves the space to live without giving birth, without being mommies, and I think it's okay.  I think I'm one of those women who would never truly enjoy her children, never enjoy the mommying.  I feel so right about this most of the time.  I'm not saying I couldn't do it, I guess, but I am saying that I'm almost 100% certain that I shouldn't.  It's different, and when all those people in my life tell me, "Oh, someday, you will want children, you'll see" I think they simply just do not get it.  Just because I have one doesn't mean I should use it.  It doesn't make me sad, the prospect of never parenting.  It exhilarates me, it makes me feel free, it gives me relief.  I feel more grief about the fact that I might feel pressured to have a child, because I worry Sam will ultimately leave me over the issue.  Again, not a real reason to have a child.

I know I'm not alone in this, and I know there are other women like that one in the paragraphs above, the one who admitted regretting having children.  (Because lest you want to put a name on it, that's exactly what it was.  I have to make it clear; I admire this woman very much for being honest about it, and in fact respect her greatly anyway.)  It's such a no-no, now, to say that you wish you'd done it differently, and not had children, as if that somehow disrespected the children you had.  I don't see it that way, of course.  But I understand that some people always will, and those are probably the same people who will continue to tell me that I'll come around and my biological clock will tick and I'll end up with a fat drooly baby on my knee, adoration pouring out of me with every diaper change and 2 am wake-up.  There's always going to be those people, both in the wider world and in my life.

I guess, like Heather Armstrong coming to terms with motherhood her way, I am in my way trying to come to terms with motherhood my way.  Which may in fact be no motherhood at all.  I say it all the time, but I am still trying to grasp the complexities that fuel my feelings on the issue.  And I imagine I will be forever, as long as I'm still able to physically bear children (shit, if indeed I am.  Because seriously?  Who knows.).  Anyway, Heather's post made me think about this stuff, and now you're reading it. 

Today is over, as far as I'm concerned

The unofficial worst day of the year is over for me.  Yes, ladies, I am speaking of the annual.  Men, I'm sorry if it's too much, but you probably have someone in your life who has to have one, so deal with it.

It's not that the annual is really that big of a deal, and it gets almost humdrum as the years go by, but it's still no fun.  Just like you don't want to have a doctor grab your balls and tell you to cough, we don't want a doctor to pry us open and poke a giant q-tip in.  In fact, I think the giant q-tip is worse. 

But it's over, huzza! and I'm clear for another year, provided that the pap comes out normal.  Two weeks and I'll know.  But my blood pressure is excellent (the nurse was so complimentary about it, it's kinda funny), my blood is normal and everything else looked fine.  Not that I was worried.

Anyway, whatever I spend the rest of tonight doing, it's all over for me.  364 blissful days to go before the ordeal happens again.  (With apologies to my sister, who has a slightly worse situation, having only a half year between each.  Sorry Kate!)

Why did the chicken cross LSD?

In the last few weeks, I've been twice stopped up on the Eisenhower by a crash that happened between the time I listened to the traffic report in my bathroom and the time when I got on the Eisenhower (about 12-15 minutes).  There is no more annoying thing in the history of listening to traffic radio than this.  I listen to traffic radio so that I can avoid the crashes, and it's frankly annoying.  And yeah, it did happen this morning, so I got to work about a half hour later than normal, though to be fair, I also decided to just chuck it, and went to the grocery store to get the dry stuffing mix I need to make my casserole tonight.  Regardless, I'm glad I stayed an extra two minutes yesterday, because now I can leave 15 minutes early and actually not be stuck in traffic tonight for 80 million hours.  Stupid Cubs game tonight.

As for the chicken thing, last week Sam and I saw a chicken on a grassy area along the bike path along the lake.  We've been doing the bike thing pretty faithfully when we can squeeze it into our schedule and I'm not sure if this was an evening ride or one of the weekend morning ones, but regardless, the chicken was unmistakably a chicken, wasn't near any human that seemed to own it, and was gleefully pecking around the grass, looking for tasty morsel.  What the hell was a lone chicken doing on the lake side of LSD?  Did it escape from the LP Zoo's farm?  It wasn't exactly close to the farm in terms of position on the shore.  In fact, I'd go so far as to say, for a chicken, it was an impossible distance.  Did someone bring their chicken for a little lakeshore peck?  If so, where was this owner?  All in all, pretty ridiculous.

Also, here's something ridiculous:  even if I keep plugging away on the cross stitch at the current rate, there's no way it will be finished by, say, March.  I'm probably 1/16 of the way done, and I mean, it's a pitiful 1/16th.  It's the easiest 1/16th of the entire thing.  So if the sixteenths keep getting harder, I'm screwed royally.  Maybe this WILL be a next Xmas present for the g-parents.  Oy vey.  The thought makes me feel like Sisyphus.  Only instead of a rock, I'm constantly pushing a needle through a piece of gray aida and never making a stitch.  Sigh.

Sex Cannon and the Bad News Bears

Busy weekend, again.  Yesterday, of course, we went to the Bears game, which although was a win, led to a very unhappy feeling among some of us.  The Bears, you see, just don't look very good.  Yes, they won.  But they just look sad and defeated on offense.  I'm not confident that Cedric Benson is a good enough running back to pick up Mr. Grossman's lack of you know, skill.  My dad says he's too short, and he just can't see his receivers over the heads of the taller people around him.  I say, who cares?  He sucks, and that's bad enough.  There's no way in hell we're going back to the Super Bowl with these schmucks playing like this.  I'm not sure if that's debatable.  We may win all our games against the bad teams, but we're going to keep getting creamed by the SD Chargers of the world.  And let's be honest, how bad did the Chargers look last night?  I only watched the first half, because I was falling asleep on the couch by ten to nine (sunburn and lots of screaming = tired me), but it seemed bad.  I think the defense LOST my mom points in the FFL.  Anyhow, I did have a very fun time at the game, and doing the tailgating beforehand (not really a tailgater, normally).  Although we may have been the ONLY tailgate going on that day where not one beer was drunk.  Truthfully, there wasn't even any beer to be had at our tailgate.  Still, fun.  Glad I went.  But not at all optimistic.

On Saturday, Sam and I went to see Rilo Kiley at the Riv.  They were very good.  Jenny Lewis' voice is the real deal.  It's so amazing and pure that the show would have been enjoyable if it were just her out there singing hymns.  But the band obviously has a lot of fun out there, so it was enjoyable all around.  But man, the crowd.  If I thought Kings of Leon or Keane was a hipster scene, I was sadly mistaken, compared to this bonanza of hipsterism.  I think I was the only girl there who had no hipster clothing items on.  There were a lot of non-hipstery guys there (probably due to Jenny Lewis' indie hotness.  I think every guy who's ever seen a picture of her wants to bone her.  I'm not kidding.), but the chicks they were with if they were with chicks were little hipster chicks.  Obnoxious.  The place was musty with the scent of smug coolness.  It made me want to scream.

Before the show, Sam and I ate at a little gay bar down the street from the Riv.  A gay sports bar.  Is there anywhere better on the planet?  This is what I need, people.  A gay boyfriend who likes football and telling me if I look good in my clothing.  When you go to Crew, you feel like it just might be possible.  Also, great mini-burgers at the place.  If you're interested in that kind of thing.

I think that is all, for right now.  My face and chest are sunburned in a bright red color, and I'm feeling kind of out of it this morning, so I can't muster up anything else to say.