Birthday

I'm moving tomorrow, so I probably won't be blogging. Although I am an addict, so perhaps I will find a way.

May 1st is my birthday! I turn 26 this year. Late twenties here I come!

It was an eventful year, a crazy unexpected year.
1) Had first real relationship since the long term boyfriend
2) Started biking
3) Sold my car
4) Moved to Chicago
5) Had second real relationship
6) Joined the Lincoln Lodge
7) Organized Chucklebowl
8) Went down 4 dress sizes
9) Won comedy award
10) Got first positive press mention
11) auditioned for a comedy festival for the first time
12) let's not forget, started baking own bread
13) said goodbye to puppy-daughter (but not forever, she didn't die, she's extremely happy in a place which is not near me)

1 car, 1 bike, 2 cities, 2 boyfriends, 1 dog, 4 dress sizes, 200 hundred comedy shows?

Yeah, I'm bragging. I know there's a lot of bragging on this blog. You know it's cause I'm not truly secure in my self-worth.

But let's get to some thank you's
- Thank you to my parents for letting me live with them last summer and moving me to Chicago
- Thank you to my brother and sister for being supportive and understanding when I couldn't give proper Christmas gifts this year
- Thank you to Kate and Jana for visiting me in Chicago
- Thank you to Mark, Ken, Allison, Steve, and Reilly for letting me into the Lincoln Lodge
- Thank you to my temp agency for finding me a job
- Thank you to my day job for paying me well.
- Thank you to Cameron for being a great writing partner and to her girlfriend Zee for being one of the first people in Chicago I had a real conversation with.
- Thank you to Laila for being the most adorable doggie in the world and making me feel needed and loved every day.
- Thank you to Elizabeth for getting me started in this great city and doing me innumerable favors.
- Thank you to Christina for being my dayjob confidante and therapist
- Thank you to J and Andy for hanging out with me for awhile and helping me work out some issues.
- Thank you to Debbie and Dave for looking after me when I was new and frightened.
- Thank you all the comics here, which I could probably list, but inevitably I would leave someone off and they'd be really insulted. But thanks, Dudes and Dudettes.

My goals for 26:
-amass wealth in the form of a large savings account
-perform at 5 colleges
-get a real press pack together
-get a real website up
-get loved up on by some nice people
-learn how to garden
-perform at a comedy festival
-put together a half hour of hilarious pro-woman material, perform said half hour and tape it.

HUGE NEWS TODAY: my best friend from college is going to MARRY SOMEONE! In August! Add that to the goals: go to this awesome camping wedding and take lots of pictures and cry (in a good way). Amazing, amazing, amazing. Life changes so rapidly.

Send me good vibes for this move. I am hopeful it will be quick and painless.

Slut!

I'm moving tomorrow, and I have a lot of shows, so I won't be posting much.

The Miley Cyrus stuff has only pissed me off MORE. Here's the debate I keep hearing:
A: Miley has a responsibility to be wholesome since she has so many young fans and how could Vogue help her to be un-wholesome!
B: Miley is a slick businesswoman who is titillating the general public to rake in the dough!

Either side is just another form of slut-shaming. It's "She's a slut, how could she!" versus "She's a slut who knows what she's doing, so it's ok for all of us to want to fuck her!"

Miley's a little kid. She's a little kid people are using to make lots of money. It's not right to use little kids to make lots of money. It's especially not right when you are building an image of the kid as a certain kind of sexual creature, and they're going to have to live with that image you created for the rest of their lives.

I don't think Miley has anything to be ashamed about. I think Vogue, Annie Leibowitz, Disney, her parents, everyone who draws their paychecks from the Miley enterprise all have lots to be ashamed about. Kids are not commodities. Kids are people who have potential us adults don't know about, and our job is to make sure we don't do anything to those kids that limits that potential.

Something very sick was going on before that photo came out. It's sick that a 15 year old is supposed to be a "role model" for a bunch of strangers.

I do think it's funny to get called a prude though. Despite being worried that my parents are ashamed of me everytime I write about sex on this blog, I guess I'm also a prude. I don't think it's anti-sex to believe that a 15 year old's sexuality is sacred and shouldn't be subject to economic reward or punishment.

Look, if Miley Cyrus is having all kinds of crazy sex of her own accord, I think that's wonderful. If Miley Cyrus is taking half naked pictures of herself for her own art projects, good for her. But treating her body like the highest good use it can be put to is arousing strangers to sell magazines is fucked up. A real person inhabits that body; it's not a business asset.

If you're going to call me anything, call me anti-business. That's true. I hate business, I hate private enterprise, I hate profit. But do not imply that I am anti-sex.

GODDAMNIT.



It's also funny to get called a prude when it's springtime and I'm horny as a motherfucker. But what do you do with horniness when you need to hold onto your autonomy, and not even waste one second feeling bad about yourself? There's nothing you can do. Fall in love and lose autonomy, or sleep around and turn on your internalized slut-beating up machine.

(Mom, don't listen to this song, even though it does advocate for safe sex.)

Americans Hate Children

There are two new pieces of evidence that we enjoy eating our young.

1. The shootings in Chicago.

2. The Miley Cyrus photos in Vanity Fair.

If you click through to the Vanity Fair website they say that Miley has a "level head that could save her from a Lindsay- or Britney-style meltdown." Right. Cause what's going on is that these young women self-destructing were just silly idiots to begin with. It's not that Disney, and Vanity Fair, and their movie studios pimped them out to the public and now those young women are in crisis, trying to figure out who they are when their sexuality has been sold to the nation.

If Vanity Fair gave a fuck about avoiding Britney-style meltdowns, they would stop publishing photos of half-naked 15 year olds. But they actually love young women self-destructing, so they'll keep finding the girls whose families care more about paychecks than their daughters, and they'll get them naked as soon as they can.

Yeah, teenage girls generally want to experiment with being sex objects. I certainly wanted to figure out what I could do to make myself hot when I was a teenager. However, just like running a sweatshop is exploitation even though workers line up for those jobs, using a teenager's exploration of adulthood to turn her into masturbation material at 15 is exploitation.

Oh, and did I mention it's evil? Yep, straight up evil. Evil to take the picture, evil to encourage your daughter to pose for the picture, evil to use the picture to sell magazines.

So what's going on with us? Have we just forgotten that other people really, actually, exist? That they have lives that will continue when we aren't in the room; that the consequences of our violence against them will continue into perpetuity?

What is amazing is not the amount of confused people doing evil things in the world, but all the people who get the crap kicked out of them in childhood who don't do evil things. How do you grow up knowing you might get shot on the way to school and still become the kind of person that takes care of your parents and children and neighbors and friends? And yet, millions of people do exactly that.

It must be that Annie Leibowitz got screwed up as a kid. Maybe that's why she can't see Miley Cyrus as a real person instead of a commodity. Maybe that's why those gangsters shooting around little kids can't see them as real people. Maybe that's why we can't see Iraqis as real people.

Ok, well, let's get uplifted. Obviously there are lots of people who need us to be nice to them this week.

My D.C. Audition

Elizabeth McQuern did me a huge solid and edited my D.C. audition into a really nice clip. Here you are:


I'm starting to feel more proud of my material and delivery.

Everyone who went up on Tuesday was fantastic. It was kind of crazy. Steve O. Harvey is the best host in the tri-state area- someone give this man a game show quick!

4/22

I've been listening to mixes on muxtape.com as a way to learn what the kids are listening to. Apparently, "Bird on the Wire" by Leonard Cohen. Hint: Willie Nelson's cover, kiddies.

Drunk Guys
When a dude is really drunk, I feel a lot of sympathy for him. Especially dudes that get very demonstrative, and confessional when they drink, because I do that! But I have to differentiate between feeling sympathy for drunk dudes and letting them hug me. I need to put my foot down sooner- I am not the hugging guru, and even if I was, most of her followers aren't trying to cop a feel.
Another lesson for me to learn: don't expect the men around you at a bar to get upset on your behalf when a guy makes you uncomfortable. No one is going to rescue you from out-of-line dude- you have to rescue yourself. I cannot remember a time when a good dude appeared and rescued me from out-of-line dude- usually the good dudes are laughing instead. So it's time for me to give up on that dream. That shit happens on tv, and not in real life. Like shampoo models having a campfire together in the desert- do not waste your time looking for it.

(edit: Those paragraphs come off as pretty passive-aggressive against good dudes. Well, in good dudes' defense, a lot of times they can't tell when things have gotten out of line. Another reason it is best for me to be able to assert myself as soon as I need to.)


Self reliance! Why do I have all these expectations against it?

Another note to self: When a drunk guy starts talking about how small his penis is, instead of earnestly explaining that it doesn't matter and size anxiety is bullshit, just get the fuck away from him. Despite your belief that size anxiety is an enforcement mechanism for our culture's domineering and cruel version of masculinity- leave it be. Let drunk dude get sober and read about it on his own.

But let me tell you blog readers:
You know what I would love in a lover? Someone who wasn't afraid to talk about sex. Someone who took sexual pleasure very seriously. Someone who would try anything once, someone who listens to me and isn't goal-oriented and is not distracted by what's on tv. Someone who's in good shape so they have a lot of stamina.
You know what I do not care about in a lover? A big dick. It's totally besides the point- same way I don't require a certain size for your hand or your mouth, I don't have a vision for what your genitals look like.
So if you want to be a better lover, get in shape, practice listening, practice being open, and break your tv addiction. Do not try to make your dick bigger- you're going to end up hurting yourself. Even if you just take fake pills, they're probably full of lead and sawdust.

I'm auditioning for the D.C. Comedy Festival tonight. Bringing my A Game.

My Baby, Your Babies

My baby is my dog, the adorable and spoiled and entitled beagle-bassett hound mix Laila. I love her very much and she loves me very much.

I got Laila with my ex, when we were about to move to North Carolina for his grad school. I had decided that since we were moving in together, and my pet rats had passed on from this world, it was time to get a starter baby. Not that getting a dog was purely about moving up on the serious relationship scale- I also just had dog fever really badly. I had it so badly one weekend I 'rescued' a loose dog, placed a found dog ad that I didn't want to get any responses to, got a response from the owner of the dog, and it turned out I had rescued that dog from its front yard. I was a dognapper.

So one day, after I had a crying breakdown about wanting a dog, me and my ex went to the Columbus Pound. I had researched some dogs that supposedly had been trained by prisoners, which in theory is a great program and let's state for the record I fully support giving prisoners an opportunity to learn skills like dog training and make their incarceration way less stressful by having doggies around. However, the prison dogs I saw that day were barely trained, and totally uninterested in us. We also saw a very cute dog who didn't even understand the command 'down!' and another dog that had pooped in its cage and rolled in it. And then there was Laila, sitting very quietly and patiently in a cage in a room full of barking dogs. My ex said she was staring at him intently through the door to the room. We took her out to the yard and she didn't seem super interested in us either. But then a pound volunteer came out to the yard and we got our first taste of a Laila greeting- a hysterical jumping, whining, full body spasm, trying-to-climb-up-your-body-like-a-ladder affirmation of your existence. That's the kind of affection we wanted! So we took her home, and Laila didn't seem confused at all about who we were or where we were going. Everything about her manner in the car said, "Glad to have finally met you, now show me where my food bowl and yard are."

Laila has taught me a lot about parenthood, especially parenthood in the face of a broken home, because me and my ex did not make it. I took her in the aftermath of our breakup because he was moving to a new city, and let me tell you, calling your ex pathetically moaning that you miss him, and having him pathetically moan back that he misses the dog- well, that is a confusing moment. But now that I am handing Laila over to him to keep for awhile, wow, do I understand.

Regarding her care, I feel great about handing her over to him. He'll spoil the crap out of her. He bought her food and water dish from a fancy pet store in his town named "Phydeaux." They stock big bags of frozen beef bones for Laila to gnaw on and leave blood and spit on the carpet with. There's multiple dog parks to bring her to in his town, and big tracts of park trails, and a general reverence for canine life that pervades town life.

Regarding my opportunities for future contact, well, I was feeling LOTS of anxiety about that, but I'm feeling pretty good about it now. He and I had it out again last week, and I feel good about respectful future contact. But since our communication styles are extremely incompatible, I never really know if things are going to be ok or not. It's like a salmon communicating with a houseplant. Laila being in the picture means it is of the utmost importance that the houseplant understands how to swim upstream, and the salmon knows how to convert sunlight into sugar. What I'm saying is, it's kind of hard.

I am really lucky to have an ex like him. Because I know he loves Laila as much as I do, and will spoil her way more than I do, and him taking her is going to make it possible for me to pursue my standup dreams. That's a huge gift to me.

Switching topics, it turns out I've been socializing with parents without knowing it. I discovered two comedians I knew had secret identities as raisers of the young on saturday. How weird. I guess I'm at that age? And yet I only have one pair of work pants.

Baking Soda, Women in Prison, Dating Tactics

Baking Soda
This weekend I have used baking soda:
-in my shoes when I wasn't wearing socks to keep the stink manageable
-while simmering my beans to hopefully cut down on gas
-in my shower to scrub off scum
-in my armpits as deodorant (don't do this, it does not work).

Women in Prison
Friday I went to a fundraiser for Books to Women in Prison. Can you guess what this group does? Ironically, the bulk of their work is consulting with other activist groups on choosing straightforward names.
Crazy good looking crowd. Forget the environment- all the attractive people are into prison advocacy. I bought a raffle ticket and won an Igo membership for a year, which is a car-sharing program! That' a really expensive prize to win! Which means this summer I can go do shows that I can't bike to!

Dating Tactics
I am swearing off playing hard to get. Done with it. Not that it isn't the most effective strategy. It absolutely is. I am just really really bad at it. So I'm going to go with what feels natural to me- being the sexual aggressor- and deal with all the straightforward rejection which is implicit in that. It feels better to me. I haven't really been playing hard to get- I've been doing this halfway thing where I play hard to get, then come on really intense, then act like I was playing hard to get. The dissonance is exhausting. So here is a guide for all the folks out there who might be wondering if I'm interested in you:
-did I ask you out on a date?
-did I ask if you wanted to make out?

If so, then yes, I am interested in you.
And if any male persons are weirded out, well, who wants someone who's so invested in traditional gender performance anyways?

Hey, ya'll

I am trying to make this a daily blog, not an every other day blog, and as a result this has become a rambling blog. Here's to you, my ramblin' blog.


But I want to give you something to read by the afternoon, at least.

God, internets, life is so good. I'm wearing new pants, and I have a new black vest that I'm excited to debut. It's fitted. The vest was not on any kind of sale, I paid full price for it. But I really think I am better off for having a fitted vest to utilize.

I was thinking about relationship advice on my bike ride this morning. One common piece of advice for the ladies is that it's not cool to withhold sex when you're angry at your man.

But, do most people want to have sex with people they're angry with? And can most people have orgasms when they didn't want to have sex in the first place?

I think having orgasm-free sex is ultimately way more harmful to the relationship than withholding sex. It takes a lot for both partners to recover from that- the partner who wanted the sex feels inadequate and slimy, the partner that didn't want the sex feels violated and resentful.

I say withhold sex! Keep it locked up as long as you want!

Yes, it may be that your partner will go elsewhere for sex. Or more likely, they will go elsewhere for interaction with someone who isn't angry with them. Maybe that's proper in your situation.

I think a lot of the tips women get for keeping their relationships strong are lousy shortcuts. What's a date night supposed to do for you if you're bored with your life? What are sex toys supposed to do if you both feel stuck in dumb jobs?

Two people can't make eachother's lives worthwhile. Two people can help eachother out a lot, and really enjoy eachother, and hopefully can assist eachother in figuring out what makes life worthwhile. I think there are limits on that last one though. Sometimes a person needs alone time, or to get seriously injured, or to develop an addiction to figure that out, and there's no way a partner will help them out.

Instead of trying to make the relationship strong, why not concentrate on making yourself strong, or even making your partner strong? Don't worry about your connection. If you don't connect to your partner, you'll connect to someone else, and they'll connect to someone else, and everyone will be fine. I'm glossing over the severe turmoil from dying personal connections, though.

Sure, be nice to your partner, that's a good idea generally, although sometimes that is not what they need, and sometimes you need to take a break from being a nice person.

I'm becoming the Ayn Rand of relationship advice. Act selfishly, let other people take care of themselves. Get what you need, trust other people to get what they need.

Oh, what am I talking about? I don't know shit about romantic relationships. Maybe the trick is to poof up your hair in a crazy bun, and wear big dresses that cover up your body completely, and speak in a quiet high tone in disjointed sentences, and be the seventh wife to a 50 year old dude and kick out your sons when they turn 13.

They look like self-actualized people to me.

Wait, How Could I Forget This?!

My best comedy friend Cameron Esposito has been working on a web series, and she released the first three. They're very interesting and will make you hate your day job EVEN MORE.

Get Tough! with Cameron Esposito

Get Tough! with Cameron Esposito

Get Tough! with Cameron Esposito

Yo, My Damies

My legs hurt. I was probably on my bike for over three hours yesterday. Riding a mountain bike is starting to be more of a pain. I see these people on track bikes, albeit briefly, since they are whizzing past me, and I feel like a slowpoke. Of course, I feel like a slowpoke because in that moment I am a slowpoke. It's nice that my subjective experience is matching up to the facts of the situation.

I've started making out with my dog's face, but not her mouth. Things have become very sensual between us, in anticipation of the impending separation. (Her dad is taking her for awhile, and by awhile I mean an indefinite and ongoing period of time.) She hates getting her ears cleaned out, and I've been using this seitan-pepperoni thing I made as bait, along with this fake trader joe's mozzarella.

I think dogs are good for mental health because most of a dog's reality is the present moment. Dogs have memories and dreams, but they don't live in the constructed stories that we do. When I eat peanut butter toast, Laila's whole being is about trying to get some peanut butter toast. She is not thinking about being given to the pound, then waiting at the pound with all those crazy barking dogs, then moving to my college house, then NC, then Cleveland, then Chicago. She's done with that shit- the peanut butter toast game is on, son!

And then I give her a piece, and she eats it in half a second, and forgets about it.

But if I lived in the present moment, would I ever go to work? Only on really boring days. Sometimes I like having a place where I'm expected to be in the morning. But most days, fuck that noise.

I think we humans make dogs into the repositories for all our childhood love and affection. As we grow up we have to stop hugging people so enthusiastically, and saying ridiculously loving things like "I'll buy you a house and we'll live there together forever Mommy!" and squealing. I'm not necessarily against us leaving those mannerisms in childhood- when I meet a woman who hasn't left behind the child-like affectations it weirds me out. But everytime I come home to Laila I say, "Hi hi hi my lovey sweet baby!"

When I'm married I'm going to try to be very enthusiastic when my partner comes home, just howling and jumping on them. Course, some people hate Laila doing that to them. Well, I won't marry someone who's not into it.

I think people have so much inner friendlines and happiness in them that we all tone down constantly, but when you tone it down all the time you end up forgetting about it. Conversely, dogs get all their inner friendliness and happiness encouraged, so they're overflowing with it (well, house pet dogs).

This is my jam today:


But I'm not talking to you. This song makes me think of this scene in "Half-baked:"


(Now, don't take this the wrong way, I like all you people and don't want you to fuck off. But I really want to say..)

Fuck you, I'm out.

Good Day

I am feeling so good today. Probably because I was feeling so miserable last night. Sometimes my misery just comes out of nowhere. It isn't my cycle's fault this time. I wrote a confrontational email to someone, and for some reason that made me feel very peaceful. Also, I called all of my ex-boyfriends, and none of them picked up. I guess that's embarassing? There was a day in february where I got an email from every single one of them, out of the blue. It was very weird, I'd hit the communication jackpot. They are a motley, generally uncommunicative crew.

Also, I'm really working on riding to work everyday, and it's my third day of it. The serotonin might be kicking in. A new habit is supposed to take 21 days to set in.

Or maybe it's because the temperature is supposed to reach 70 today.

That peaceful feeling will probably go away when I get a confrontational email back, or even worse, if I don't get an email back. Well, that's the deal with confrontional emails. The upside is you don't have to talk to people face to face, the downside is they don't have to have any reaction to you.

I've been thinking a lot about getting strong, physically. My upper arms have a lot more definition than they did last year, because I've lost some weight. Also, it seems leaning over your bike handlebars must do a little something for your arms. But what if I did a lot of something for my arms? Also, what if I could kickbox?

I hate failing at athletic stuff. When I can't keep up with people I feel so ashamed. But you know what, I felt that way when I was 11, and now I'm almost 26, I shouldn't live like an 11 year old.

Hmmm, but do I want to join a gym? I don't think I would just go and lift weights by myself. Maybe I should take a class. Especially now that the Lodge is ending, I'll have way more time.

Hey, HERE'S SOMETHING TO SPREAD THE WORD ABOUT:
In Lee County, Florida, as of April 20th, prisoners will only be able to receive and send out postcards instead of mail in envelopes. Let's all email the sheriff letting him know what a nasty, vicious policy change this would be. Limiting family contact and written expression is cruel. And letters from jail are some of the best letter there are.

update: I called 239-477-1340, which is the public information line, and the very polite man who answered my call said the Captain would give me a call back. He also said they haven't gotten many calls about it. Time to change that!

The Ugly Truths About Me

-I'm starting to think standup comic is not good enough. I might need to become a pastor.
-I cried over a breakup that is two weeks away from being two years over and done with tonight. In public. While walking the dog.
-I think I'm a saint for eating brown rice so much.
-There is currently a boy that I like, and who I have creeped out by liking. If he reads this blog (which he doesn't) he'll only be more weirded out.
-That's a pattern of mine.
-I think my crotch smells pretty good, actually.
-My high school history teacher called me lazy, and I think he was onto something.
-But also, I don't know if laziness is always a vice.
-I read sex worker blogs at work
-And then I ponder what kind of money I could make stripping
-But I don't know if I trust myself with all my days.
-I wonder how embarassed my parents are of me
-I wonder if my siblings think I'm annoying or unkind
-I can't share my bed with anyone because I clench my jaw and my whole face hurts in the morning.
-My farts are so foul since I started cooking vegan. Foul and constant.
-I'm obsessed with myself! (Obv.)
-I can be such a spectacularly shitty friend- like, almost abusive.
-My mom thinks I hate women.
-Sometimes I think I'm a man-hater
-I'm not a good enough dog-owner
-people from my middle school weird me out
-i think i should be in People's 50 Most Beautiful People, but I think they would airbrush me
-i think if i just confess stuff, it means it doesn't matter anymore
-i want my siblings to have kids ASAP
-when i post a video here, it means I watched it 100 times in a row

I love this song, and love this video for how very 90's it is.

Hello! We're back to the beginning!


see more crazy cat pics

Another week of possibilities has begun!

You might have thought, oh no, it's monday, another 5 days of feeling my eyeballs melt from the blinding light of my laptop screen. Another 5 days of taking naps in the office bathroom, and anxiously waiting my turn on the microwave (I only have a half hour here, let's go ladies).

Oh, you will be bored this week. You also stand a good chance of being morose, of being weepy, of biting your tongue when someone makes wild and unsolicited statements about the faults of others, also you may read the news and have to ask your coworker repeatedly, "What is wrong with these people? Are they kidding?" Your coworker will just shake her head in sympathy.

Perhaps in the stew of habitual behavior a new phase will begin in your life that will initially go unnoticed. Perhaps you will discover your calling by surfing the web, or meet your true love, or stumble upon a way to make a million dollars.

What would I like in a romantic partner?
I want someone who's crazy. I want to be constantly surprised by the stuff they talk about. I want them to initiate insane projects that overwhelmingly will not be completed. I want their curiousity to distract them from work that needs to be done. I want them to scoff at the 'shoulds' of society. I want to have long discussions with them about how the universe works. I want them to change their mind about how the universe works weekly. I want them to be funny in a totally unique way, but hopefully utilizing some funny voices.
Also, I want them to be very demonstrative and cuddly. And make a habit of friendliness.
Re: physicality- crazy geniuses can get away with stuff like hunchbacks.

What did I do yesterday?
Juno is now at the three dollar theater, so I was walking there (of course without a bra on, because duh, it was sunday) when I saw a sign for a screening of 'Sicko' at a local church at 4. And I looked at my phone, and it was 4:06, and I looked at the church I was standing next to, and it was indeed the church referred to on the sign. Well, I LOVE Michael Moore movies, and I LOVED Sicko, indeed, I think it may be his best movie. If I ever met Michael Moore it would be very hard to keep from hugging him, which would probably be creepy for him. So of course this screening is in the basement of a church, and of course it's co-sponsored by the Green Party, and the usual cast of activist characters are there (know-it-all dude with crazy hair, older women in fleece and clogs, young happy dude with statistics, young women in yogic clothing, girl without bra on). It turns out that the Green Party candidate for the state senate in my distract is HOT, and was dressed like Robert Redford in the movie from the seventies about the sellout politician. Meaning button down shirt, pants, tie, but everything was just fitted enough. Love it!

We watched the movie, and I laughed, I cried, I felt moved to action. So we had a discussion afterwards, and it was predictably ridiculous (lots of pronouncements about the kind of country we want to be, and our duty as citizens), but I think those discussions are really fun, once you learn to ride the boredom. My point is I may start going to protests for a single payer healthcare service (read: socialized medicine). My policy is I only do stuff that is fun, so the moment it become un-fun I'm bailing. But hey, standing outside Aetna and bothering strangers, maybe yelling? That's more than do-able. Especially if the Green party hotties show up.

Someone during the discussion said they feel like voting is pointless, and going to protests is pointless. I didn't say, but I wanted to, did you see anyone at the protest you wanted to touch in an intimate way? What more do you want from your acts of dissent?

Maybe if you're feeling like political action is pointless, you need to find a younger cause for awhile. I think environmental groups have the hottest activists, they're all vegan and usually from richer families. Hmmm. Then once you've gotten laid you can go to small neighborhood protests about knocking buildings down and bullshit- those protests are always full of old people and kids, so all you get out of it is feeling virtuous.

But no, I feel pretty hopeful about the tail at these single payer events. And isn't a hotter country what extending access to healthcare is all about? Yes, that sums it up.

What about the good times?

I have been running scared since getting cheated on, dumped, and then dropping out of law school. I took that summer and just cried all the way through it, frozen in shock. But after I un-froze, right around when I withdrew from school, my flight response kicked in.

What did I have to do to get away from the persona I had created which was killing me? Carrie the reasonable, Carrie the responsible, Carrie the adult- she pursued me mercilessly, chainsaw in hand to saw me into pieces and bury me out behind the wood shed.

Plans were made and quickly executed. Pay off what I owed my law school? Done. Pay off my private loan? Done. Save all my money to move? Done. Move to a city full of strangers? Done. Poorness and insecurity were much less scary than the spectre pursuing me.

I've gained a lot of ground on her. I keep looking over my shoulder, and usually I can see her in the distance, limping but still steadily moving forward.

"You could be a paralegal for a couple of years and pay off all that student debt" she calls to me.

"You could own a little house in cleveland and have a couple of dogs" At the mention of dogs I turn around, and she has new strength in her stride.

"Houses are so cheap right now, and maybe you could work for a labor law firm, and people wouldn't doubt how smart you are, and you could keep writing this blog to express yourself..."

And the chainsaw has been raised, and she's getting ready to swing, and I'm off again, like a rabbit disappearing into the bush.

But I haven't had to run as much lately. I've been prey for so long I don't know what to do with time off from fleeing. I am protected now. I have enough money. I have enough friends who have never been allied with Carrie the Responsible. Plain old Carrie has been getting lots of appreciation.

So what do rabbits do when a dog has stopped chasing them? I only see them when they are keeping an eye on a predator (me). Do they ever relax? They build nests, and they make rabbit love and have baby rabbits, and then spend long days chewing on clover, right?

What's my version of that?

If I could go back to being 19, I would tell so many people (men, actually) "Don't talk to me that way." I was in love with getting talked down to, yelled at, smirked at, ignored. Just ate it up. I think I thought becoming a woman was about being battered until your faults fell off like a lamb's tail.

Those men got to talk to me that way because I had turned my back on plain old carrie, and had allied myself with Responsible Carrie. They got to prey on me because I was preying on myself. There were so many boys who I should've bared my teeth at.

Every once in awhile I would. The fight urge would overwhelm me, and the tension would rise up through my arms and my eyes would flash and my voice would become low and growley.

One instance:

My ex's friend Nathan, who is a sociopath, came back to town from basic training. Nathan was consistently a shithead to me. He was also my ex's best friend, and I kept thinking that there must be something I didn't understand about him, or that I was rubbing him the wrong way and maybe if I could learn to walk the tightrope we could be friends. Despite witnessing him treat women like shit, across the board, no exceptions. I think that may have been what my ex liked about him so much. Lots of people liked Nathan, because I guess everyone hates themselves and wants to be smirked at.

I saw him out about town and invited him to a happy hour to see my ex. Because geez, if I just try a little harder, if I just prove what a nice, reasonable girlfriend I am, then he'll have to be nice to me.

No. That isn't how things work.

My ex and Nathan talked and talked and talked at the happy hour, and I talked to other people, another demonstration of how reasonable and nice I was (I don't need to be attached at the hip to my boyfriend! You men have your time together!) But then I made the mistake of joining their conversation, and was quickly punished. Nathan was talking about how all the guys in his boot camp class loved Bush. I was going to ask how that squared with troops being upset about stop loss policies.

"But aren't they.." I offered.

"Shut the fuck up" he countered.

"No, you can't.."

"Shut the fuck up"

"You can't.."

"Shut the fuck up"

And my fight instinct kicked in, rightfully so.

"You can't talk to me like that Nathan, I'm not your fucking girlfriend. From the moment I met you you've been an asshole, and I'm glad you joined the army, I hope you get shot and die."

Yes, I did tell someone going to Iraq to get shot and die. Also, his long-abused girlfriend was standing right there.

I ran to the bathroom and cried. I was ashamed of myself for exploding like that. Why? Where did I learn that fighting back against clear abuse was something to be ashamed of? Where did I learn that I should be able to take it, without ever giving it back? I waited until my face was halfway normal, then I went back into the bar and told my ex (who, of course, was still sitting with Nathan) that I was going home. He said, no, I'll come with you. I said, no, I don't want you to. He said, no, I'm coming. Then he said goodbye to Nathan, very apologetically.

I wish I had really gone home, but then some people showed up and I got talked into going to another bar instead of going home, and all that meant was that I was screaming at my ex on the sidewalk and crying in the next bar. I didn't know how to stick to my guns. My ex said he thought the whole exchange was a joke until I ran off.

I wish I had been sufficiently protective of myself to not apologize for that incident. I wish I had considered myself valuable enough to see what a crime it was to be talked to that way. I wish I had said to my ex, "You bring abusive people into my life, and I can't afford to waste even one friday night being insulted, and so we have to part ways."

I really didn't want to believe that I was prey. I really wanted to believe no one was out to get me, that if I just followed all the rules I would never be hurt, that there should be no need to defend myself.

Fighting back is proper. It is as natural as eating and sleeping and shitting. Having to fight back does not mean you made a mistake along the way. There are predators in our midst, and you didn't turn them into predators, and you can't make them see that they shouldn't prey on you. You have been entrusted with your gifts and abilities and voice, and you have been given the duty to protect those. The only proper way to react to an insult, to abuse, to belittlement, to smirks, towards physical violence is to use everything you've got to get those predators away from you.

But now that I've learned that lesson, I need to learn the next one: what do rabbits do once the dog has tired out?

Sexuality, False Witness

For the past two days I've just been beginning and erasing blog posts. I'm trying to be a daily provider of new internet content, but man, it is hard to figure out how much I want to tell the internet.

I finished Susie Bright's "Full Exposure" and really liked it. It's about how honesty and respect for the kind of erotic creature you are can inform your creative life.

You know, not bearing false witness is one of the commandments. I think it's the commandment that gets the least respect. Right away, in 2nd grade when we were discussing the commandments, the teacher asked, "What about white lies? What about lies to keep from hurting someone?" Maybe she was trying to get us 8 year olds to engage critically with religious tradition, but her questions suggested that we should tell the truth except when other people really don't want to hear it.

You should tell the truth. But not if the truth is you like soapy fingers up your butt. Cause no one wants to hear that.

I mean, if a guy sat next to me on the train and told me that I'd get off the train. That's a context in which telling me that information forces unexpected intimacy onto me while locked in a big moving metal box with other people. That's unfair.

But the only socially valid context to share that information is in a darkened room with a long term heterosexual partner, quietly please. For all the intimations of sex we see in our ads for burgers and computers and shoes, talking about the specifics of physical pleasure is uniformly regarded as creepy. Maybe you can get away with talking about stuff publicly if you're a playboy bunny, but please make your physical pleasure suitable fantasy fodder for other people. Don't say something odd like, "I can't even feel my nipples since I got these implants. But I love having my pudenda rubbed." Or, "After I had my baby I didn't want to have a penis in my vagina, but I did like to have my husband jerk me off very gently when we'd cuddle."

No wonder people freak out looking for a long term heterosexual partner. There are so many parts about our bodily experiences that we can't ever acknowledge.

You shouldn't commit adultery, and you shouldn't covet your neighbor's wife (or house, or oxen: hey, thanks moses, us gals like the idea of being someone's estate). But the judeo-christian conception of god actually never told us that expending time and energy figuring out what makes us feel physically good is selfish or sinful. (He did say that dudes aren't supposed to ejaculate on the ground- my theory is mesopotamian farmers were tired of finding spunk on their seedlings.)

One of the point Susie Bright makes is that the incest taboo is so strong in our culture that we are intensely uncomfortable with regarding our family members as sexual creatures. Now, obviously, your kids don't want to see you have sex. Shut the door, when they knock on the door tell them to go away. But what's the harm in letting them know what was going on behind the door? "Me and your father were having sex. That's a big part of our relationship, it's why we were first so interested in getting to know one another. We still have sex, and even your grandma is still having sex, because even though you will only see 19 year olds having sex on tv, actually all kinds of people have sex. That's one of the reasons why you should give people time alone when they say they want it."

If your kid says, "So when do I get to have sex?"

You can say, "Well, since your body is still growing up, just spend some time by yourself figuring out what feels good. When you're thinking about touching someone else like that come talk to me."

Then you'll hear about it when the sicko at the library jerks off in front of them, and you'll also hear about them playing doctor with the neighbor kid. Don't you want to know that stuff?

Don't you like how I know everything there is to know about raising kids, and I only babysat twice?

Back to that 'Not coveting' commandment:
That was so hard for me to understand when I was a kid, because of course if your neighbor has a great house the first thought in your mind will be "I want that house!" But yeah, it is wise not to feed that thought. Follow up that thought with, "The house I eventually get will be the perfect house for me." Trust in abundance, Oprah book club members.

I tend to covet people in relationships. People in relationships are more attractive than single people because you see them being snuggly, having a good time, radiating love and happiness, and single people look uncomfortable and sour in comparison. I try to remind myself, there are enough people to go around, there is enough love to go around, there are enough houses to go around, etc. It is definitely possible to acknowledge a covetous thought without feeding it, in fact, you have to acknowledge it before deciding not to feed it.

But also, if I like someone and find out they're in a relationship, I do limit the time I spend with them. That's part of not feeding the thought. I had an ex-bf that I used to talk on the phone with, and when I found out he had a girlfriend I didn't feel right about it at all anymore, so that was the end of that. It's not like we were having phone sex, but if you get a gut feeling that something's inappropriate, it is.

Not that people are other people's property. But you have to deal with the truth of the situation- there are promises of ongoing intimacy boundaries that have been made between two people.

In a lot of ways I think "don't bear false witness" is the most important commandments because it's about dealing with the world as it truly is, and allowing other people to deal with the world as it truly is. That's what having integrity is about- all the facets of your reality are integrated, there are no secret lives lurking in the shadows, everything is being accepted and dealt with.

Then again, 'don't murder' is pretty important.

I also think we're all on journeys to that level of integrity, it's a hard ideal to shoot for, and you will fail a million times a day.

In this context though, telling kids there is a Santa Claus seems like a really bad idea.

Creation!
Oh, wow. What a weekend.

Friday I performed at the Lincoln Lodge, and then at the Ha Ha Hotties showcase. (Ok, I hate that name, but the last two Ha Ha Hotties showcases have been really good, because all women shows are way better than a theory of gender equality would predict.) I didn't do new material, I haven't been very happy about my new material, but getting up on stage and talking is always valuable.

But I did realize that Beth Stelling cracks my shit up. She's a standup prodigy. She's doing the O.I.N.K. showcase at the Playground Theater this wednesday and it's her birthday, so if you live in Chicago go to that show.

Saturday I did a bunch of errands. I made lentil soup, which I didn't realize I was CRAVING. I have been eating massive amounts and my guts are being scraped clean. GROSS.

Sunday I had the monthly Lincoln Lodge meeting, and then Cunt Gun rehearsal at Elizabeth, Nellie, and Teresa's place up in Andersonville. The LL meeting went until 12:30, the rehearsal was at 2:15, so I biked up there early and went to the feminist bookstore again. I bought a menstrual cup, we'll see how that works out. See the lengths I'm willing to go to to save the earth? Or to not have to buy tampons every month?

So, Cunt Gun rehearsal went AMAZING. I learned two chords, and we wrote two songs, largely due to Ruby's musical experience. Tammy wailed on the bucket, and Teresa rocked out on the flute. I swear. For reals. Best flute solo I ever heard.

We are playing at the Globe Gong Idol tonight. It should be amazing.

It's a New World Today!

Yes folks, the world has irrevocably changed from yesterday, it will never ever go back to what it was, because Novella Telfer is now here!


Her dad is Dan Telfer, and for the non-chicagoans who read this, he's a very funny standup, improviser, writer, producer, etc. His blog, Baby Parade, is on my sidebar.

She's beautiful. I don't think I have met her mom, but from pictures I can tell you there is a striking resemblance. I think Novella looks like a very contemplative person, but Dan wrote that she was 'hyper-alert' when she first got out and then got sleepy.

Novella, you decided to join the party at a weird time. We've got some people here that are out of control with violence and greediness. They weren't loved right when they were little. The weather has gotten way more intense because those people have created a world where everything runs on gasoline and coal, and we let them do that because we didn't understand how bad that really was. We've been letting those people run the show for awhile now, hoping to placate them, but that's probably going to end pretty soon. You don't need to worry about it, us guests who have been here for awhile are figuring out how to handle them.

HOWEVER, even though the party has gotten weird, it's still a party! Your hosts, Dan and Vicky, are very kind and smart people, and you are going to have a ton of fun with them. They're going to introduce you to lots of cool people, animals, ideas, stuff to do with your new body (bowling! dancing! softball! punching and kicking! swimming! cuddling! you wouldn't believe all the stuff we've thought up), food, books, pictures, the list goes on and on.

Everyone's been invited to the party for a reason, but the deal is you have to discover your reason, no one can tell you (because we're all as clueless as you are). So take in everything you can, and observe how you feel while you're trying everything out. You have a sensor inside that'll give you a signal when you're getting close to figuring out your reason for getting invited. It's called a 'calling', or a 'vocation', or your 'dharma.' It's a physical sensation, you'll feel all of sudden like you know exactly what to do and that you're in harmony with a larger process. It's cool and a little freaky.

So since we're all trying to find our reasons for the invites, the way to relate to other party guests is to love them. That means when you look at them you try to see all the potential people they could become, and also all of the people they have been. It can be tough to do. Your hosts are your best examples for how to do this, because they effortlessly see all your potential and remember everyone you have been. Now, your hosts will make a lot of mistakes, and as you grow up you'll sort all of that out and figure out where you can do better, but their example is a valuable gift. When you love someone you make it easier for them to discover their reason for the invite, because you're relating to who they really, truthfully are. Oh, and you absolutely have to love yourself. That's actually the most important thing to do, I should've put that first. Being down on yourself is never ever the right thing to do, you're not viewing yourself honestly, and why waste your time?

We're so excited you came! The party needs someone like you to really get bumpin'.

(Dan, it's so presumptuous of me to write to Novella. I'm baby crazy.)

This must be a Thursday. I could never get the hang of Thursdays.



Try a little tenderness. Maybe treat yourself tenderly today, maybe treat a friend tenderly, maybe treat a stranger tenderly, maybe treat an inanimate object tenderly. It rarely hurts the situation to be tender.

Don't make your empathy a golden ring for others to win, just for a little while. Just give it away. In a little while you can go back to seeing if people are measuring up.

Do you guys like it when I write to myself, but act like I'm writing to you?

Thich Nhat Hanh said when you find someone you really despise, who really seems evil and despicable, you should picture them as a little baby, before they became despicable. Dick Cheney was an itty bitty baby once.

I've been listening to lots of love songs. Here are my favorites:
Nina Simone: To Love Somebody


Dwight Yoakam: Back of Your Hand


John Legend: Stay With You


Sarah Vaughan: The Nearness of You


Lauryn Hill: The Sweetest Thing


Also, please check out my band, Cunt Gun, at cuntgun.blogspot.com. We'll write some love songs to revolution, cooperative living, and gender equality, but probably not in praise of heteronormative courtship.

Animalnatomy

via Kate Harding


and a Jonathan Coulton song.

What animal would you like to be?
When I was little I wanted to be a cheetah, because they are the fastest mammal. I hate running because it makes me hurt all over, but if I was built like a cheetah I think I'd like it a lot.

Um, sure, a cheetah will win in a foot race, but could a cheetah host a comedy show? The gauntlet has been thrown down, cheetahs. And you can't use meat as bait. But you can have a 30 foot head start.

Now I would like to be a sloth, cause they can eat food that is LIVING on their BODIES. How's that for local? (ba da bum)

see more crazy cat pics

If I could get surgery to fix anything on my body, I would replace my hands with long claws so I could attach myself securely to trees and I would cover myself with fur to sustain a colony of bugs on myself. Also, I want a spine that lets me turn my head around 180 degrees. And I want the powers of echolocation. So I want to be a sloth-owl-bat.