From The Privilege of Positivity by John Pavlovitz
If being positive, means to not call out abject racism,
if it means, not to advocate for migrant families in cages,
if it means, to silently ignore human rights atrocities,
if it means, allowing my LGBTQ friends to have their rights eroded,
if it means, to make peace with bigotry in the highest levels of our Government...
if it means, to avoid unpleasant conversations about the things that burden my heart because they make other people uncomfortable—then I guess I won’t be positive today.
Being positive is a privilege.
If you are living a life where you will post nothing but kitten videos and photos of your food on social media to that you don't have to have anything "negative" in your life these days, you are privileged. If you aren't having to worry about coming home to find our spouse gone - deported - or an eviction notice that you know is because your landlord found out you're gay, if you have never had to worry that your son, husband or brother will die in police custody or during a traffic stop, if no creditors are calling you, if you haven't spent hours on the phone and in offices fighting for access to health care, you are privileged.
I am privileged in a million ways. But I'm still thinking about, and talking about, kids in cages. Oh, and yes, those ARE concentration camps - every reference to the Nazi camps BEFORE the world knew they were death camps is "concentration camps." They are referenced in Casablanca and joked about in To Be Or Not To Be - two movies made before the world realized they were so much more than just concentration camps.
Wonder what we're going to realize as time goes on and the truth emerges...
I'm not saying post the kitten videos. I like the kitten videos. But if you get to take a break and "stay positive", at least recognize your privilege.
Sunday, July 14, 2019
Sunday, July 7, 2019
Oregon called & said "No, thanks."
When I moved back to the USA, I was determined to make a home out of wherever it was I chose to live, to fully integrate myself as a returned citizen after 10 years abroad.
I had a plan on how to do it. And I was methodical and diligent and strategic. And I thought I was doing great. In pursuit of fully investing in this community, in order to call it "mine":
And, yet, at a face-to-face job interview in June - only the second face-to-face interview I've had for a job since moving back to the USA - I was asked, incredulously, why I was applying for a local government job because, after all, I wasn't really a part of the community. It was the moment when I knew that I wasn't getting the job.
Outside of the city of Portland, the state of Oregon is one of those places that, if you weren't born here, or somewhere else in the Pacific Northwest, your presence here is looked at with skepticism. If you move here from another part of the USA - particularly, God forbid, from California - then the only acceptable reason for you to move here is that you, or your spouse, got a job at Intel or Nike or that you had to take care of your parents or in-laws that still live here. I expected Texas to treat outsiders this way, but in the more than four years I lived in Texas, I felt welcomed, even when I was well outside of Austin. Were it not for the annual six months of unbearable heat, I would have moved back to Austin when I left Germany.
I have lived in Oregon longer than I lived in Germany. And for 10 years, pretty much every time I have told someone in Oregon that I moved here from Germany, they have asked, incredulously, "Why?!" The question is loaded with all kinds of inference, including:
Why would you leave Europe?
Why would you give up your career?
Why would you choose here and not New York or Washington DC or San Francisco?
This area has NOTHING to offer YOU.
Among the MANY phrases I would love to never, ever hear again is this one:
Why did you move here?
It’s not said as a put down of the place where I live, as in Why would you move to this place, which is really boring. It’s said as a put down of me, as in If you have really done all this international work and international travel, why did you move to Oregon, to this place where I was born/chose to live? It’s said with snark, with incredulity, and often, with skepticism. The implication is that I must be lying about my background, or be hiding out because I screwed up somewhere else.
The backlash in Oregon regarding newcomers is exhausting. Oregonians make it clear that if you aren't born here, you will always be an outsider. How hostile can it be here for people not from here? Here's but one example of the kinds of things posted to the community group for the city where I live in the PDX metro area:
What we need is NO MORE people here!!! I know I sound like a broken record but the city leaders of this town just dont care if ths town stays small and manageable or not. Way too much new housing. This is all going to come back and bite everyone in the hiney with everyone having their hand out for more money for schools, electricity, transit, grocery stores and on and on. It's done and it's just going to get worse now. It all feels so defeating. Just sad
These comments are posted ALL the time. And if I'm feeling unwelcomed, I can't imagine how horrible it is for the many Latino immigrants all around me.
Contrary to popular belief, I cannot live anywhere I want to in the world. I cannot live in Scotland, for instance, because I am not a citizen of the United Kingdom. And I can't work in any language other than English, which negates any chance of me ever working in Europe unless some international agency recruits me. And I don’t want to live in a big city - New York or Washington DC or San Francisco - because, while I have loved living in big cities when I was younger, and while I love visiting them, I’m older now and my tastes and lifestyle has changed. I want to have a garden, I want to walk in neighborhoods that have trees, I want to sit in my backyard and feel somewhat isolated, I want to walk to neighborhood festivals… to do that in a residential neighborhood in Portland would require a salary of about half a million a year, and in San Francisco… I’d have to win big in the lottery.
Why is it weird that I’ve chosen a small town in Oregon? I have to live somewhere. Why not Oregon? Why not this little town of less than 30,000 people?
And why can't someone live in a small town and also care about world affairs, travel globally, even work globally? Why can't someone live in a small town and also want to learn other languages and delight in different cultures? Is all of that reserved only for people living in big cities? Really? And why is it strange that someone would try to make a home here, to treat the community as something more than just a place to sleep at night?
I had all sorts of great reasons for choosing to live in the Portland, Oregon area, in addition to the weather: I had heard it was fun and progressive and bicycle-friendly and had great beer and was booming economically. But I knew after just a week that Portland wasn't quite what we'd been told. The first year we were here, I would comment about how taken aback I was at the open drug use and homelessness in downtown and Portlandiers were offended at my comments - "I haven't seen that" and "It's no worse here than anywhere else!" and on and on. I stopped talking about it. And progressive? The Oregon tax system favors the top 1% just like everywhere. The booming businesses here do not support nonprofits financially anywhere near the rates they should, and the salaries offered by these nonprofits are shamefully low - far from living wages. The condition of too many public schools - infrastructure, class sizes, arts offerings - are also shameful, and all these supposedly progressive folks in Portland refuse every bond measure to make things better. You would think an area that prides itself on being progressive would have outstanding public schools and the funding for such. Portlandiers wax poetic about their mass transit system - but as someone who actually takes it regularly, relies on it, I can tell you that I'm one of the few people on the bus with a driver's license, one of the few people taking it out of choice. And bicycle-friendly? That's been the biggest joke of all. No way would I ride a bicycle in downtown Portland. I'm terrified every time I do it here in this small town.
Do I feel cut off living in this small town? Oh, gads, yes. If you live outside the USA, you actually know what is happening globally. In the USA, we’re on a global news blackout. I wish so much we got CNN International. I have to work to stay connected to what's happening outside this country. Some Facebook groups I'm on for humanitarian workers, Twitter and non-USA news outlets are very helpful in that regard. But having that international focus seems to isolate me even more from people around here.
None of my efforts have lead to me feeling a part of anything. None of it has made me feel like I'm making a different in the places where I've lived since moving back here. They haven't even lead to that many friendships (though I'm grateful for the few I have gotten as a result). In fact, it's lead to far more negative comments and experiences than positive ones. Maybe it's just Oregon, but the amount of snarky comments here for anyone trying to do something good, whether they are running for office or volunteer at an event, are overwhelming. There's only one other place I've seen such cutting down of tall poppies: Afghanistan, where women - I guess because they have so little power - will cut other women down like it's the most fun you can possibly have.
I have a specific walking route that I do with my dog on weekdays, and I do that route specifically to avoid people - I just want to think and be alone, especially lately. A local guy that runs a couple of nonprofit initiatives and recruited me to volunteer for such - and I've resigned from them and really don't want to be involved with anymore - saw me walking and stopped his car, pulled over, and said, "I really would like to walk with you and talk with you." And I know I turned white as a sheet. I almost started crying. I said, "No, I'm on my own time right now, I can't talk, maybe next week" and I just walked away. I just felt so... goddamn it, leave me alone! He wasn't being creepy, but it just felt so unbelievably, incredibly intrusive. And I'm like, well, great, where am I supposed to walk now to avoid people, including YOU? I want a t-shirt that says, "Don't talk to me."
I used to be Miss Good Morning! In fact, two former local frenemies made fun of me for being that person, and for how much I missed living in a place where people say "Good morning" and how I was trying to be that person here. They are both native Pacific North Westerners, and they think greeting strangers is stupid and intrusive. They loved to roll my eyes at how much I liked to talk to neighbors, how I stopped frequently during walks to chat people up.
Welp, I guess I'm now a true Pacific North Westerner: I don't want anyone to talk to me. Have you avoided me because I'm such a chatty Cathy? Well, don't worry - those days are over. The only person who still has to put up with that is my husband and my hairdresser.
Months after we bought this house, my first house ever, I tried to read Sinclair Lewis' Main Street, hoping for a similar literary experience to Elmer Gantry, one of my favorite books of all time. But I had to quit early on because the story was WAY too close to what I had experienced in my first four years in Oregon: outsider moves to a town, tries to be friendly, tries to be a part of the community, gets a hostile reception, gets derided for her ideas and her worldliness, becomes isolated and ends up being miserable.
For all I know, we would have been miserable had we moved elsewhere, or had we stayed in Europe. Maybe this is the best we could have it: my husband got employed almost immediately after we moved to Oregon, and in the job he is in now, he is beloved. He's got a career, a beautiful place to ride his motorcycle and he's a volunteer firefighter. I'm so happy for him.
I'm not as nice as I used to be. And I think it's not only because of the November 2016 election - I think it's also because of the Pacific Northwest. I try to remember, and to care about, the potential to do one good thing for someone else today, or this week. I try to remember, and to care about, how much a small act of kindness can mean to strangers, neighbors and friends - opening a door for someone whose hands are full, offering to take a shopping cart back for a woman dealing with a grumpy child, giving up your seat for someone you decide needs it more, not getting upset at a screwup by a shop clerk - I try to remember, and to care that, it can mean whether or not someone goes home and cries as soon as they get home, and for the rest of the night. I try to remember that I do have power, and I can use it for good or for bad.
But trying is getting harder and harder.
Here in Oregon, it feels like all of my work for the last 10 years to invest in this community has been for absolutely nothing. Making this my home has been like a full-time job for me, in lieu of having an actual full-time job. And none of it, ultimately, has mattered.
I'm not from here, and I'm never to forget that. Okay, message has been received: the people of Oregon are just not that into me.
I had a plan on how to do it. And I was methodical and diligent and strategic. And I thought I was doing great. In pursuit of fully investing in this community, in order to call it "mine":
- I bought my first house ever in my life, here in Oregon, in the county where I live now.
- I joined a citizens' government advisory group regarding bicycles and pedestrians in the Oregon town where I lived before this one, and joined another one, regarding public safety, after moving here.
- I participated in a series of citizens advisory meetings by a state agency regarding bicycle tourism.
- I joined a county government advisory board for the arts.
- I joined the local chapter of the League of Women Voters.
- I took the 12-week citizens academy by the local sheriff's department and went on a ride-a-long with a deputy overnight.
- I've volunteered at candidate forums and attended even more.
- I 've attended town halls by local elected officials - state representative, US Representative and US Senators.
- I've attended so many city council meetings and work sessions that a rumor started that I was running for office.
- I put in almost 24 hours checking ballots about to be counted in the 2014 elections here in the county where I live.
- I registered voters at a local farmer's market and an area high school.
- I've had coffee with staff from various local nonprofits, people running for office, local government officials - even the police chief.
- I regularly searched for nonprofit and government events to share on Facebook and Reddit, and live-tweeted a couple of local government events, and shared so much, so often, related to government meetings that people have asked me if I work for the local government or the local newspaper.
- I've attended civic theater productions, university shows and public lectures.
- I have been a user of the mass transit in this region as my primary means of town-to-town transportation for the entire 10 years I've been in Oregon and I joined the online advisory group for mass transit (I fill out a LOT of surveys).
- I started a Facebook group to talk about bicyclists and pedestrians in this part of the county where I lived, and was invited to talk about it on a local public access TV show
- I volunteered to help move a public library to its new building (and made my husband volunteer too).
- I did a free workshop on my area of expertise for local nonprofits and met with people founding nonprofits to help them solidify their visions.
- I attended two public events at a mosque in the county and attended some events at area churches - I'm an atheist, but I wanted to show my support for these specific events.
- I've walked every neighborhood of the town where I live. Granted, it's not that big a town, but I've walked EVERY neighborhood.
- I've attended a range of public events all over the county, from strawberry festivals to German Christmas markets to corn roasts to a world premiere theater production.
- I volunteered with local Girl Scout troops for almost two years.
- I've ridden my motorcycle all over Oregon, and all over this county in particular - I think I've seen more of both than most people born here.
And, yet, at a face-to-face job interview in June - only the second face-to-face interview I've had for a job since moving back to the USA - I was asked, incredulously, why I was applying for a local government job because, after all, I wasn't really a part of the community. It was the moment when I knew that I wasn't getting the job.
Outside of the city of Portland, the state of Oregon is one of those places that, if you weren't born here, or somewhere else in the Pacific Northwest, your presence here is looked at with skepticism. If you move here from another part of the USA - particularly, God forbid, from California - then the only acceptable reason for you to move here is that you, or your spouse, got a job at Intel or Nike or that you had to take care of your parents or in-laws that still live here. I expected Texas to treat outsiders this way, but in the more than four years I lived in Texas, I felt welcomed, even when I was well outside of Austin. Were it not for the annual six months of unbearable heat, I would have moved back to Austin when I left Germany.
I have lived in Oregon longer than I lived in Germany. And for 10 years, pretty much every time I have told someone in Oregon that I moved here from Germany, they have asked, incredulously, "Why?!" The question is loaded with all kinds of inference, including:
Why would you leave Europe?
Why would you give up your career?
Why would you choose here and not New York or Washington DC or San Francisco?
This area has NOTHING to offer YOU.
Among the MANY phrases I would love to never, ever hear again is this one:
Why did you move here?
It’s not said as a put down of the place where I live, as in Why would you move to this place, which is really boring. It’s said as a put down of me, as in If you have really done all this international work and international travel, why did you move to Oregon, to this place where I was born/chose to live? It’s said with snark, with incredulity, and often, with skepticism. The implication is that I must be lying about my background, or be hiding out because I screwed up somewhere else.
The backlash in Oregon regarding newcomers is exhausting. Oregonians make it clear that if you aren't born here, you will always be an outsider. How hostile can it be here for people not from here? Here's but one example of the kinds of things posted to the community group for the city where I live in the PDX metro area:
What we need is NO MORE people here!!! I know I sound like a broken record but the city leaders of this town just dont care if ths town stays small and manageable or not. Way too much new housing. This is all going to come back and bite everyone in the hiney with everyone having their hand out for more money for schools, electricity, transit, grocery stores and on and on. It's done and it's just going to get worse now. It all feels so defeating. Just sad
These comments are posted ALL the time. And if I'm feeling unwelcomed, I can't imagine how horrible it is for the many Latino immigrants all around me.
Contrary to popular belief, I cannot live anywhere I want to in the world. I cannot live in Scotland, for instance, because I am not a citizen of the United Kingdom. And I can't work in any language other than English, which negates any chance of me ever working in Europe unless some international agency recruits me. And I don’t want to live in a big city - New York or Washington DC or San Francisco - because, while I have loved living in big cities when I was younger, and while I love visiting them, I’m older now and my tastes and lifestyle has changed. I want to have a garden, I want to walk in neighborhoods that have trees, I want to sit in my backyard and feel somewhat isolated, I want to walk to neighborhood festivals… to do that in a residential neighborhood in Portland would require a salary of about half a million a year, and in San Francisco… I’d have to win big in the lottery.
Why is it weird that I’ve chosen a small town in Oregon? I have to live somewhere. Why not Oregon? Why not this little town of less than 30,000 people?
And why can't someone live in a small town and also care about world affairs, travel globally, even work globally? Why can't someone live in a small town and also want to learn other languages and delight in different cultures? Is all of that reserved only for people living in big cities? Really? And why is it strange that someone would try to make a home here, to treat the community as something more than just a place to sleep at night?
I had all sorts of great reasons for choosing to live in the Portland, Oregon area, in addition to the weather: I had heard it was fun and progressive and bicycle-friendly and had great beer and was booming economically. But I knew after just a week that Portland wasn't quite what we'd been told. The first year we were here, I would comment about how taken aback I was at the open drug use and homelessness in downtown and Portlandiers were offended at my comments - "I haven't seen that" and "It's no worse here than anywhere else!" and on and on. I stopped talking about it. And progressive? The Oregon tax system favors the top 1% just like everywhere. The booming businesses here do not support nonprofits financially anywhere near the rates they should, and the salaries offered by these nonprofits are shamefully low - far from living wages. The condition of too many public schools - infrastructure, class sizes, arts offerings - are also shameful, and all these supposedly progressive folks in Portland refuse every bond measure to make things better. You would think an area that prides itself on being progressive would have outstanding public schools and the funding for such. Portlandiers wax poetic about their mass transit system - but as someone who actually takes it regularly, relies on it, I can tell you that I'm one of the few people on the bus with a driver's license, one of the few people taking it out of choice. And bicycle-friendly? That's been the biggest joke of all. No way would I ride a bicycle in downtown Portland. I'm terrified every time I do it here in this small town.
Do I feel cut off living in this small town? Oh, gads, yes. If you live outside the USA, you actually know what is happening globally. In the USA, we’re on a global news blackout. I wish so much we got CNN International. I have to work to stay connected to what's happening outside this country. Some Facebook groups I'm on for humanitarian workers, Twitter and non-USA news outlets are very helpful in that regard. But having that international focus seems to isolate me even more from people around here.
None of my efforts have lead to me feeling a part of anything. None of it has made me feel like I'm making a different in the places where I've lived since moving back here. They haven't even lead to that many friendships (though I'm grateful for the few I have gotten as a result). In fact, it's lead to far more negative comments and experiences than positive ones. Maybe it's just Oregon, but the amount of snarky comments here for anyone trying to do something good, whether they are running for office or volunteer at an event, are overwhelming. There's only one other place I've seen such cutting down of tall poppies: Afghanistan, where women - I guess because they have so little power - will cut other women down like it's the most fun you can possibly have.
I have a specific walking route that I do with my dog on weekdays, and I do that route specifically to avoid people - I just want to think and be alone, especially lately. A local guy that runs a couple of nonprofit initiatives and recruited me to volunteer for such - and I've resigned from them and really don't want to be involved with anymore - saw me walking and stopped his car, pulled over, and said, "I really would like to walk with you and talk with you." And I know I turned white as a sheet. I almost started crying. I said, "No, I'm on my own time right now, I can't talk, maybe next week" and I just walked away. I just felt so... goddamn it, leave me alone! He wasn't being creepy, but it just felt so unbelievably, incredibly intrusive. And I'm like, well, great, where am I supposed to walk now to avoid people, including YOU? I want a t-shirt that says, "Don't talk to me."
I used to be Miss Good Morning! In fact, two former local frenemies made fun of me for being that person, and for how much I missed living in a place where people say "Good morning" and how I was trying to be that person here. They are both native Pacific North Westerners, and they think greeting strangers is stupid and intrusive. They loved to roll my eyes at how much I liked to talk to neighbors, how I stopped frequently during walks to chat people up.
Welp, I guess I'm now a true Pacific North Westerner: I don't want anyone to talk to me. Have you avoided me because I'm such a chatty Cathy? Well, don't worry - those days are over. The only person who still has to put up with that is my husband and my hairdresser.
Months after we bought this house, my first house ever, I tried to read Sinclair Lewis' Main Street, hoping for a similar literary experience to Elmer Gantry, one of my favorite books of all time. But I had to quit early on because the story was WAY too close to what I had experienced in my first four years in Oregon: outsider moves to a town, tries to be friendly, tries to be a part of the community, gets a hostile reception, gets derided for her ideas and her worldliness, becomes isolated and ends up being miserable.
For all I know, we would have been miserable had we moved elsewhere, or had we stayed in Europe. Maybe this is the best we could have it: my husband got employed almost immediately after we moved to Oregon, and in the job he is in now, he is beloved. He's got a career, a beautiful place to ride his motorcycle and he's a volunteer firefighter. I'm so happy for him.
I'm not as nice as I used to be. And I think it's not only because of the November 2016 election - I think it's also because of the Pacific Northwest. I try to remember, and to care about, the potential to do one good thing for someone else today, or this week. I try to remember, and to care about, how much a small act of kindness can mean to strangers, neighbors and friends - opening a door for someone whose hands are full, offering to take a shopping cart back for a woman dealing with a grumpy child, giving up your seat for someone you decide needs it more, not getting upset at a screwup by a shop clerk - I try to remember, and to care that, it can mean whether or not someone goes home and cries as soon as they get home, and for the rest of the night. I try to remember that I do have power, and I can use it for good or for bad.
But trying is getting harder and harder.
Here in Oregon, it feels like all of my work for the last 10 years to invest in this community has been for absolutely nothing. Making this my home has been like a full-time job for me, in lieu of having an actual full-time job. And none of it, ultimately, has mattered.
I'm not from here, and I'm never to forget that. Okay, message has been received: the people of Oregon are just not that into me.
Sunday, June 16, 2019
10 years as a motorcycle rider
10 years ago, in June 2009, I took the Motorcycle Safety Foundation Basic Rider Course in Louisville, Kentucky, a course delivered by the Derby Motorcycle School. In fact, I signed up for the course months before I had even arrived back in the USA, when I was still living in Germany, because I knew these classes fill up quickly.I got my license just a few days later after finishing the course, in July 2009.
And I'm still a motorcycle rider.
It's 10 years later and I've ridden more than 43,000 miles on my own motorcycle - almost 70,000 kilometers - almost all of it for fun on vacations and the weekends (rather than commuting). I did it on two motorcycles, actually: my first bike was a 1979 Honda Nighthawk, which I bought in November 2009 and road for two years, and now, my 2008 Kawasaki KLR 650, which I got in October 2011.
Via my motorcycles, I've been:
- all the way up through British Columbia, up to the Yukon via the Cassiar Highway and back down the Alaska Highway
- to Jasper, Banff and Kootenay National Parks
- Yellowstone, Western Montana and Wyoming
- all over Nevada, including Great Basin National Park and, of course, Rachel Nevada
- Arches, Canyonlands, and Capitol Reef National Parks, and Goblin Valley State Park in Utah
- Lava Beds National Monument, Lassen National Monument, Emmets Pass, Devil's Postpile, and lots more of Northern California and everything in between that and where we live in the Portland Metro area.
- All Over Idaho - which might not sound like much, but it's one of my favorite trips!
- Olympic National Park, Gifford Pinchot National Forest / Southern Washington State - really, and all over Washington state
- Steens Mountain, Eastern Oregon, including the Alvord Desert - all over Oregon - like up to Mt. Hebo via Siuslaw National Forest Service Road 14.
- And regularly all over Washington, Yamhill, Tillamook, Clatsop, Columbia, Clackamas and Wasco in Oregon, and Skamania and Klickitat counties in Washington state.
Whether someone commutes by motorcycle, does simple cruises on a weekend, goes on epic long-distance trips for weeks or rides off-road, I totally get why people love riding a motorcycle. It's hard to say why I love riding a motorcycle without using clichés. It's so incredibly empowering to ride a motorcycle - it makes me feel stronger and more confident and more capable of handling life. I love how connected I feel to my surroundings on a bike and I love the focus I have on the road and the landscape and the surroundings when I'm riding. I feel so incredibly present when I'm riding, and I do not think about my professional work or cleaning my house or all my many obligations and responsibilities. My mind is completely free of all stress and worries. I'm just riding - turning this corner, taking this curve, stopping at this light, going over this hill. I love the long trips and I love just riding across town and back. I love the challenges: I love doing something I find hard to do, and doing it over and over and getting more and more comfortable doing it - and it may take a few hours or it may take months. I love that the more I practice, the more I ride, the better I get at riding. I love that I'm always improving. I wish everything that needs improving in my life was just a matter of practice.I love after parking my bike and taking off my helmet and looking up and seeing a group of people staring at me, in surprise or disbelief or awe. I admit that I'd also love it if they frowned or otherwise looked disapprovingly. it shouldn't matter what people are seeing when they see me, but it does, and I like my image as a motorcycle rider - I'm not even going to pretend that doesn't matter. It does.
And I really love meeting people - people are happy to walk up and start talking to my husband and me when we stop on our motorcycles.
Stravaig, which is pronounced straw vague, is an Irish and Scottish word meaning to wander about aimlessly. One goes stravaiging about the roads. Stravaig is probably from an even older and obsolete word extravage, meaning to digress or ramble. I am all about stravaig, both on my motorcycle and in conversations: I love exploring and traveling and I really love exploring and traveling by motorcycle. It is fascinating and challenging and soul-reviving as anything you can experience.
I don't see how I ever could have weathered the disappointments I've experienced since moving back to the USA, especially professionally, if I wasn't a motorcycle rider. When I get on the bike, I'm not thinking of all the hours I've spent preparing consulting proposals and job applications, hours that, by and large, have been for naught. When I'm on the bike, I'm not second-guessing the choices I've made. It's therapy, it's a mental reboot, it's an oasis, it's a shot of serenity.Like I said, it's hard to talk about without sounding clichéd.
If you are a woman, I really encourage you to think about becoming a motorcycle rider. I swear it's cheaper than therapy.
- My advice for getting started as a motorcycle rider
- Getting started on a dual sport: my journey (Changing from a cruiser to a dual sport)
There's no obligation to get your license after you take a basic riding course. It's worth the price just to have the experience of trying, I promise. If you don't fall in love with it - if you do it and think, oh, no, not for me, hey, that's okay too! Congrats for trying.
If you do fall in love with it, as I did - see you out on the road.
10 years of motorcycle riding. Here's to at least 25 more!
Sunday, June 2, 2019
Memory: 10 years ago in June
My first blog space is long gone, but many of my first blogs were captured and are on the Internet Wayback Machine, also known as archive.org, if you know where to look.
Here's one of my blogs from the evening of 28 June 2009 - I'd been back in the USA for just over two months, after living in Germany since February 2001, and was adjusting to life back in my home country and home state. I had to change the MySpace links though:
Our adventure in Louisville continues:
Stefan went to his first baseball game (it was also Albi's first baseball game and his first dirt track race. Guess which he liked more? And Stefan went on his own to a motorcycle gathering for motorcycle travelers/adventure riders in Eastern Kentucky (hurrah! there are such people in the USA! He's been worried...)
We've also made trips to Mammoth Cave (took the Historic tour; Stefan liked it very much), Maker's Mark Distillery (free samples!), Lincoln's Birthplace and various places on Bardstown Road (the Irish pubs, the Homemade Ice Cream and Pie Kitchen, and the The Falafel House, where I dazzled the staff with my SEVEN words of Arabic).
Special thanks to my friend Jennifer, who made Stefan feel extra welcomed by donning a black wig, blacking out her front teeth, and running across the parking lot of Lynn's Paradise Cafe while yelling, "Stefan! Stefan! Welcome to Kentucky." He's still recovering from that cultural experience. I spent the whole event laying on the sidewalk convulsing with laughter.
Stefan now has his green card.
I've been listening to the local public radio station, WFPL, and often, the announcer says, "This news hour is brought to you by: The Embassy of Germany. Learn more about Germany as a vacation destination or as a partner for your business..." I'm impressed! The public radio audience in Louisville is *exactly* the type of audience that Germany should be going after, no kidding. We've wondered for the last eight years how Germany advertises to Americans. Through June, we only have access to TV-by-antennae, and so far, I haven't seen any advertisements for Germany -- guess the network TV audience isn't their desired demographic.
Watched Sheba, Baby, a rather bad movie with the fabulous Pam Grier, on TV the other day, because it turned out to have been filmed in Louisville, Kentucky in the 1970s. My how the city has changed! Awful movie, but the city scenes, and Grier's outfits, were fun.
It's so nice to have TV in English again, I cannot lie... I also got to enjoy the Tony Awards live for the first time since 2000. My verdict on the 2009 show: Best. Opening. EVA. And, as well, Greatest. Closing. EVA. Host Neil Patrick Harris was terrific (there wasn't enough of him actually), musical numbers were terrific, and except for Carrie Fisher's TRAIN WRECK of an outfit, everyone's dresses were terrific. Ultimate compliment is from Carmen Thornton, expert on Tony Awards and wine maven at Old Town in Louisville: "This stands up to the 1987 Tony award, which I have on tape." What more of an endorsement do you need?
I've taken TARC, the local bus system, a few times this summer and enjoyed it immensely. The drivers were friendly and helpful, the buses were clean, and the web site is comprehensive and detailed. Only complaint: TARC doesn't allow dogs. Highlights of my TARC trips:
USA men's soccer victory over Spain in the Confederations Cup? Rapturous. It was all I could do to stop myself from honking the horn of the U-Haul wildly as I drove across Tennessee (heading back from Austin). The loss to Brazil? Heart-breaking. And I'm someone who has had her heart broken over sports many, many times...
Yes, we road tripped to Austin, to deal with various matters, since Austin was my official home while I lived in Germany. Highlights of that trip: seeing Star Trek (awesome) at the Alamo Draft House (also awesome) while eating artichoke pizza (also awesome), playing table shuffleboard at Shoal Creek Saloon and the bartender donning a mullet wig, taking Stefan to Ginny's Little Longhorn, eating at Enchiladas y Mas and our hosts, Sharron and Ron.
Unfortunately, we're having to move again before leaving Louisville, because the place we're renting has another tenant waiting. Most of our things are in storage, and we're moving just up the street, but we still have enough to make it annoying to have to move again.
And then we'll move again at the end of July and head to Portland, Oregon (or there abouts).
And we did head to Portland, and stay, and almost 10 years later, we're still in the greater Portland metro area... or there abouts...
More about my travels
Here's one of my blogs from the evening of 28 June 2009 - I'd been back in the USA for just over two months, after living in Germany since February 2001, and was adjusting to life back in my home country and home state. I had to change the MySpace links though:
Our adventure in Louisville continues:
Stefan went to his first baseball game (it was also Albi's first baseball game and his first dirt track race. Guess which he liked more? And Stefan went on his own to a motorcycle gathering for motorcycle travelers/adventure riders in Eastern Kentucky (hurrah! there are such people in the USA! He's been worried...)
We've also made trips to Mammoth Cave (took the Historic tour; Stefan liked it very much), Maker's Mark Distillery (free samples!), Lincoln's Birthplace and various places on Bardstown Road (the Irish pubs, the Homemade Ice Cream and Pie Kitchen, and the The Falafel House, where I dazzled the staff with my SEVEN words of Arabic).
Special thanks to my friend Jennifer, who made Stefan feel extra welcomed by donning a black wig, blacking out her front teeth, and running across the parking lot of Lynn's Paradise Cafe while yelling, "Stefan! Stefan! Welcome to Kentucky." He's still recovering from that cultural experience. I spent the whole event laying on the sidewalk convulsing with laughter.
Stefan now has his green card.
I've been listening to the local public radio station, WFPL, and often, the announcer says, "This news hour is brought to you by: The Embassy of Germany. Learn more about Germany as a vacation destination or as a partner for your business..." I'm impressed! The public radio audience in Louisville is *exactly* the type of audience that Germany should be going after, no kidding. We've wondered for the last eight years how Germany advertises to Americans. Through June, we only have access to TV-by-antennae, and so far, I haven't seen any advertisements for Germany -- guess the network TV audience isn't their desired demographic.
Watched Sheba, Baby, a rather bad movie with the fabulous Pam Grier, on TV the other day, because it turned out to have been filmed in Louisville, Kentucky in the 1970s. My how the city has changed! Awful movie, but the city scenes, and Grier's outfits, were fun.
It's so nice to have TV in English again, I cannot lie... I also got to enjoy the Tony Awards live for the first time since 2000. My verdict on the 2009 show: Best. Opening. EVA. And, as well, Greatest. Closing. EVA. Host Neil Patrick Harris was terrific (there wasn't enough of him actually), musical numbers were terrific, and except for Carrie Fisher's TRAIN WRECK of an outfit, everyone's dresses were terrific. Ultimate compliment is from Carmen Thornton, expert on Tony Awards and wine maven at Old Town in Louisville: "This stands up to the 1987 Tony award, which I have on tape." What more of an endorsement do you need?
I've taken TARC, the local bus system, a few times this summer and enjoyed it immensely. The drivers were friendly and helpful, the buses were clean, and the web site is comprehensive and detailed. Only complaint: TARC doesn't allow dogs. Highlights of my TARC trips:
- A very old black gentlemen -- one of those unofficial-mayor-of-the-neighborhood types -- regaling everyone at a downtown bus stop with incredible stories of when Al Capone and various famous performers of the era would visit Louisville, where black entertainers stayed during Jim Crow, etc.
- A middle-aged white good ole' boy standing in the front of the bus talking to the driver, telling her in his strong Kentucky accent, "Well, I don't want to sound sissified or nuthin', but that thar Yoga really helps me calm down. You'd think hittin' a hammer all day would really release all yer anger, but it don't like Yoga does."
- A young white woman telling two different people on the bus, with no shame whatsoever, that she had spent Sunday night in jail on a suspended license and what a HUGE inconvenience it was not to be able to use her car now, adding, "I've NEVER been in no trouble before" (so, dear madam, how then do you explain that suspended license?).
- Realizing why the young, large black woman looked so very, very uncomfortable in her seat in the front of the bus: the bus driver stopped at an intersection next to a hospital, even though the light was green, and honked the horn until the guy in scrubs crossing the street and wearing an MP3 player turned around to see what the noise was; the driver yelled, "Hey, come over here and help this woman over to the hospital. She's havin' a baby." When someone on the bus remarked how sad it was that the woman had had to take public transportation to the hospital to have a baby, the driver said, "Well, that's how I did it myself!"
USA men's soccer victory over Spain in the Confederations Cup? Rapturous. It was all I could do to stop myself from honking the horn of the U-Haul wildly as I drove across Tennessee (heading back from Austin). The loss to Brazil? Heart-breaking. And I'm someone who has had her heart broken over sports many, many times...
Yes, we road tripped to Austin, to deal with various matters, since Austin was my official home while I lived in Germany. Highlights of that trip: seeing Star Trek (awesome) at the Alamo Draft House (also awesome) while eating artichoke pizza (also awesome), playing table shuffleboard at Shoal Creek Saloon and the bartender donning a mullet wig, taking Stefan to Ginny's Little Longhorn, eating at Enchiladas y Mas and our hosts, Sharron and Ron.
Unfortunately, we're having to move again before leaving Louisville, because the place we're renting has another tenant waiting. Most of our things are in storage, and we're moving just up the street, but we still have enough to make it annoying to have to move again.
And then we'll move again at the end of July and head to Portland, Oregon (or there abouts).
And we did head to Portland, and stay, and almost 10 years later, we're still in the greater Portland metro area... or there abouts...
More about my travels
Sunday, May 26, 2019
a change is a comin'
It was going to work like this:
We would start planning, in 2008, to move back to the USA in 2009, and I would start job hunting before we had left Germany. I would probably get a job offer before we moved, because, you know, I'm so fabulous, but, if not, no problem, I would get one soon after we arrived in Louisville, our temporary home, of course, and we would move wherever that job was. And if not, then we'd move to Portland, Oregon. Either way, I would start working in a senior position at some nonprofit or government agency, because I am just SUCH a highly-desired professional, while Stefan took classes and got a feel for the states. Might take a year or two, but he'd find a job, eventually. And we would work and explore the USA, build up a nice nest egg, and after 20 years or so, we'd move back to Germany and I'd stop working, and maybe Stefan would too, because we would have So. Much. Savings.
Well, it didn't work out that way.
I'm so glad that Stefan got hired almost immediately once we moved to Portland and that, because of his job, we got to go to Mexico. And then he got a much better job and that's given us the financial security we need to live day to day, year to year - while I flounder, employment-wise, for more than 10 years. And maybe this is the year I finally accept that.
Yes, since moving back from Germany, I've lived in the USA 10 years - my anniversary for moving back was in April, and we will have lived 10 years in Oregon as of September. It hasn't gone how I had hoped, except for the travel and motorcycle riding - although Stefan is terribly disappointed we haven't traveled more. He remains stunned at just how bad the vacation time is in the USA. Me too.
It would take living here until 2023 to have lived in our house, and Forest Grove, for 10 years, and for a while, I was urgently hoping for that milestone, but I don't think it's going to happen. I think it's very likely we'll be moving back to Germany before then - or, at least, by then.
We would start planning, in 2008, to move back to the USA in 2009, and I would start job hunting before we had left Germany. I would probably get a job offer before we moved, because, you know, I'm so fabulous, but, if not, no problem, I would get one soon after we arrived in Louisville, our temporary home, of course, and we would move wherever that job was. And if not, then we'd move to Portland, Oregon. Either way, I would start working in a senior position at some nonprofit or government agency, because I am just SUCH a highly-desired professional, while Stefan took classes and got a feel for the states. Might take a year or two, but he'd find a job, eventually. And we would work and explore the USA, build up a nice nest egg, and after 20 years or so, we'd move back to Germany and I'd stop working, and maybe Stefan would too, because we would have So. Much. Savings.
Well, it didn't work out that way.
I'm so glad that Stefan got hired almost immediately once we moved to Portland and that, because of his job, we got to go to Mexico. And then he got a much better job and that's given us the financial security we need to live day to day, year to year - while I flounder, employment-wise, for more than 10 years. And maybe this is the year I finally accept that.
Yes, since moving back from Germany, I've lived in the USA 10 years - my anniversary for moving back was in April, and we will have lived 10 years in Oregon as of September. It hasn't gone how I had hoped, except for the travel and motorcycle riding - although Stefan is terribly disappointed we haven't traveled more. He remains stunned at just how bad the vacation time is in the USA. Me too.
It would take living here until 2023 to have lived in our house, and Forest Grove, for 10 years, and for a while, I was urgently hoping for that milestone, but I don't think it's going to happen. I think it's very likely we'll be moving back to Germany before then - or, at least, by then.
Even so, I've now lived in this town longer than I've lived anywhere since leaving my hometown in Henderson, Kentucky. Yes, I've lived here longer even than anywhere in California or in Austin, Texas. It doesn't at all feel that way.
We hope to do a motorcycle trip down through Baja, California, Mexico and back in March 2020. And I hope to finally get to New York City and some parts of New England this year or in 2020 and see people I've been promising to see for the last 10 years. I also hope to do a road trip of my own in Kentucky and Tennessee, either this year or next - sans motorcycle (I'll probably be by myself, in fact). But in 2020, it will probably be time to start thinking about when we'll move back to Germany and how we are going to do that.
If you have put off visiting me in Oregon, time is running out, so you might want to make those plans for a visit before 2022.
There's lots and lots to do before a move back to Germany. First and foremost, Stefan will have to find a job (I won't be able to find one: I don't speak German, I am not German, and it's even harder for a woman my age to find a job in Germany than in the USA). And that could take a couple of years of job hunting once we do decide to start planning. But if there is one thing moving around so much in my life has taught me: you have to start thinking about these things many months, even years, in advance. At least I do.
If you have put off visiting me in Oregon, time is running out, so you might want to make those plans for a visit before 2022.
There's lots and lots to do before a move back to Germany. First and foremost, Stefan will have to find a job (I won't be able to find one: I don't speak German, I am not German, and it's even harder for a woman my age to find a job in Germany than in the USA). And that could take a couple of years of job hunting once we do decide to start planning. But if there is one thing moving around so much in my life has taught me: you have to start thinking about these things many months, even years, in advance. At least I do.
Thinking about leaving the USA for 20 years or so this time has made me nostalgic. I've been thinking about what I've loved most about living in the USA again - and I'm working on accepting that it may be for the last time. If I made a list of the things I love here, how long would the list be? Turns out it's 15 things - all things I didn't appreciate fully until I lived elsewhere:
- Motorcycle riding. There is no country better for motorcycle riding. There is such a tremendous amount of scenery to take in and fantastic roads to enjoy in the USA, more than any other country. It's so easy to find beautiful places on well-maintained roads without much traffic - and easy to find scenic, well-maintained gravel roads as well. We've made a point of exploring as much as possible in the Pacific Northwest, and even in our 10 years here, there's still so much we will leave without seeing. And so much of what we've seen has been just once - I'd so love to go back and make a second trip to so many places we've experienced. But time has, sadly, run out.
- Camping. Again, there is no country better for it. So much of European camping is tents and cabins right on top of each other, packed in tightly, and not somewhere scenic. It's wonderful that there are so many camping sites in Europe near villages and even in the middle of large cities, which makes touring around surprisingly affordable. But the amount of camping in the USA, the incredibly beautiful places where you can camp, the jaw-dropping sites, the wildlife you see - it's something I love about my country, that I love beyond measure.
- Food. Screw you foodies. Screw you, Europe. The food in the USA is the BEST in the WORLD. Yes, there is amazing food all over the world. But the variety you can find in the USA, the fusion of different cultures - it's AMAZING. I get so tired of Europeans saying they hate the food in the USA - and then it turns out they eat only at McDonald's and Olive Garden when they are here. Some of my husband's friends came to visit from Germany and the only restaurant they liked where we live is one I loathe, one where most of the food is made offsite - nothing is fresh. It's edible but boring - and just a few blocks from a couple of very decent, tiny Mexican restaurants they would never try. In the USA, the variety of pizza, the variety of barbeque, the unique pub food, diner food, the little family restaurants, the endless number of fusion restaurants - it's great stuff and I miss it terribly when I live abroad.
- Being able to easily communicate. I've really enjoyed living abroad in Germany, Afghanistan and Ukraine in years past, but I also can't deny the profound frustration of not being able to easily make a haircut appointment and say what I want done with my hair. Or ask in a shop for something. Or have a conversation with someone anywhere - standing in line for a movie, sitting on the bus, whatever. Or making jokes with grocery store checkout people. Doing all that chitchat is a part of who I am - when I'm abroad, all I can do is smile (or not even that, since many other cultures, including in Germany, think smiling is weird). And finding a doctor, finding a dentist, and communicating with his or her staff... it's a constant struggle.
- Civic engagement. I had intended to get involved in local government and local nonprofits when I came back to the USA, long before I came back to the USA, and I did as soon as I got back to the country, but I ramped up my activities in 2017 and have continued through 2019. It's been inconvenient, frustrating and exhausting - but it's also been very satisfying and taught me a lot about people and communication. There are few countries that make it as easy to get involved in politics or to volunteer with nonprofits as in the USA. I'll really miss it when I move back to Europe, where protests are normal but this type of civic engagement is strange, and NGOs aren't really interested in someone who doesn't speak the local language (and, really, why should they be?).
- TV in English. I have always watched too much TV. Way too much. But I love it. Especially Turner Classic Movies and PBS. And I like watching channels with programming curated by someone. When you watch a channel curated by someone, you end up making all sorts of amazing discoveries. TCM has turned me on to actors, movies and genres I never would have given a chance if the choice had been mine on exactly what to watch, when and where. TCM says, "Take a chance, give this a try." And often, it leads to delight. A few months ago, I watched H Is for Hawk: A New Chapter on Nature on PBS. It came on after the PBS News Hour and I didn't change the channel quick enough. And I got sucked into an amazing story I never intended on watching. It was amazing. That never happens when you live abroad - you are constantly asking your friends for recommendations of what to watch, trying to find illegal downloads online... you miss a lot.
- Concerts and other performances in English. I haven't been to many in these 10 years, certainly not as many as I was hoping once I moved back to the USA, but the ones I've been to have been wonderful. Portland, Oregon is no Austin, Texas, that's for sure, but it's fun to hear music I love on stage, performed live, even just a couple times a year. Europe just isn't into live music like we are here as well - no nice little bluegrass band at brunch and what not. They also want a performer to perform the music EXACTLY like you hear it on the CD.
- Friends. I have really enjoyed seeing long-time friends in-person, however rarely, these last 10 years. And I've loved how easy it is to make friends in the USA. It's very hard to make friends in other countries - even migrants who live here in the USA have told me that. I'm really, really going to miss this.
- Mass cultural experiences. Feeling right at home in the movie theater on the day a new Star Wars movie is released. Or that community-feeling you get when everyone is flocking to the latest Marvel movie. Or some song or band we all seem to love - or want to make fun of. It's a silly little fun thing I didn't realize we did here in the USA until I came back. I've missed it when living abroad. And I'll miss it once we move back.
- Clothes. I know that all clothes are made in Asia, but I greatly prefer American fashions to what's sold in Europe. Europeans love horizontal stripes (ick) and a lot of color - like red pants (ick).
- Books in English. This should be way higher on the list, of course. Again, it's like TV in English: of course, I can order a book in English from most any German bookshop or from Amazon. But it's so nice to stand in front of a bookshelf and pick something. Or a lot of things. I may do a few days in England every year just for this experience.
- Our public lands. Our national parks, national forests, national monuments, Bureau of Land Management lands, state parks, state forests and other public lands - they are the BEST IN THE WORLD because they are everywhere. Yes, other countries have public lands that are just as beautiful - but as many and accessible and as varied and as vast? Nope - not even close. I have relished every moment in public lands in the USA - and Canada, for that matter. It's been glorious. Oh how I'm going to miss it.
- Black Americans and black American culture. I hope I'm not fetishizing this. But Black American culture is different than black culture anywhere else, and for me, it's an essential, fundamental part of my country. And it's quite varied within the USA itself. The food and music and perspectives of black Americans is an important, integral part of my country, an essential part of it, and when I'm abroad, I miss it. There's nothing quite like it - not even in sub-Sahara Africa - which is wonderful in and of itself, of course.
- Kentucky. Living briefly in Louisville and getting to work briefly in Lexington, and getting to drive all the way across the state, made me fall in love with my tribal homeland for the FIRST time. In fact, I even fell in love with a job there and wondered, could I live in Louisville or Lexington? Could I? I had dreamed of riding my motorcycle over the Spottsville bridge, riding up to a family reunion in Audubon Park... But that's not going to happen.
- My stuff. I love looking at my bookshelves, looking at my movie posters, looking at my certificates, looking at my plaques, looking at the things I've curated over the years... They bring me joy. But those can't go with me when I go abroad. It's too much. So, therefore, I know that I'm supposed to get rid of them, since I may never live in the USA again, but I don't think I can. Instead, I'm going to try to reduce everything I want to keep down to what would fit in a 5'x10' storage building - 50 square feet. And hope there is someone out there willing to house that storage unit on their property for 20 years (I'll pay you rent!). Because maybe, when I'm 80, I'll come back to the USA to live out my days, and I can have those things around me at my retirement home. That would make me very happy. That would bring me joy.
Well, I think that's it. I intend to keep enjoying the aforementioned as much as possible in the years I have left in the USA, which could be three more years, but I don't see it as five more. And the tradeoff for moving back to Germany is universal, affordable health care, easy access to more than a dozen countries and affordable access to more than a dozen more, and taking my dog on mass transit and into restaurants and bars.
I hope friends will come visit once I move back to Europe, but I know circumstances are so different than when I lived there at the start of the century: ya'll are putting kids through college, enjoying grandchildren, and thinking many hours in a plane doesn't sound all that appealing anymore. You've also got your own retirement expenses to think about. So many of you came when I lived there before - you've had your European vacation and may not really want another. I get that. But if you can visit, I'd love to host you. Heck, I'd probably be willing to meet up with you in Amsterdam, Brussels, Madrid, Prague... just keep me posted.
I hope friends will come visit once I move back to Europe, but I know circumstances are so different than when I lived there at the start of the century: ya'll are putting kids through college, enjoying grandchildren, and thinking many hours in a plane doesn't sound all that appealing anymore. You've also got your own retirement expenses to think about. So many of you came when I lived there before - you've had your European vacation and may not really want another. I get that. But if you can visit, I'd love to host you. Heck, I'd probably be willing to meet up with you in Amsterdam, Brussels, Madrid, Prague... just keep me posted.
Thursday, May 16, 2019
I do not have to share this. But I am.
I'm very private about my health issues and health care. If you follow me on social media, you may have noticed that I rarely even mention doctors' appointments or even dental appointments. I hate that my dentist office has an open floor plan, where there is just one big room for all procedures and patients are blocked from seeing each other by cabinets - you can hear everything said in the space next door, which means others can hear my conversations with the staff there. The most I'll be open about is my weight loss - and even then, I'm holding back a lot because what I've gone through health-wise because of weight IS NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS.
I really hate my health issues being public.
I know a lot of people who are very open about their health issues - depression, cancer, surgeries, medication, whatever. I'm not at all condemning them, mostly because I often read those posts. A friend wrote emails to her friends about her cancer treatments over a few years and I learned SO much - I had no idea what certain treatments really involved, even though I'd heard the names of such many times. It was very educational for me and I appreciated it.
But no one who is going through or has gone through any illness, condition or medical treatment should ever feel obligated to share their story. I think having a root canal should be private if a person wants that to be private. And I feel the same about aborting a pregnancy. Neither are procedures someone should feel ashamed of, but the motivation for people not sharing them often doesn't come from shame - it comes from a feeling that person has that medical procedures of any kind are NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS.
That I aborted a pregnancy is none of your business. I don't have to share publicly that I aborted a pregnancy and no one else has to share that they have done so. And I've never intended to share it publicly, not because I'm ashamed of it - I am not ashamed of my abortion - but because it is NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS.
But state legislatures across the USA are working to ban the procedure of aborting pregnancies. Restricting access has been bad enough: women forced to watch videos designed to scare or shame them into canceling the appointment, waiting periods designed to make it impossible for some women to make an appointment, clinic requirements designed to make it impossible for some clinics to continue operations, etc. Those restrictions have lead to thousands of women forced to give birth, and if you think all of those stories ended with happy, healthy babies and women ultimately grateful that they carried the pregnancy to term, you live in a fantasy world - I'm the person that those women will tell, quietly, away from everyone else, that this is not a happy ending. Those restrictions on access to abortion services have NOT come with funding for pre-natal care, maternal health care, infant care, post-natal health care, rent and food assistance for women forced to quit jobs, child care, etc., so no one can say this is somehow "pro life" with any sincerity whatsoever. The bans on abortion won't come with any of that funding either.
I'm not going to tell you why I wanted an abortion because IT'S NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS. I'm not going to tell you a story that works to garner your sympathy regarding the circumstances regarding my getting pregnant or what my life was like at that time because IT'S NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS and because IT DOESN'T MATTER WHY A WOMAN WANTS TO ABORT A PREGNANCY. It does. not. matter. No debate, no discussion, don't even try with me.
I aborted a pregnancy. I have zero regrets about accessing abortion services. The person who shared responsibility for that pregnancy isn't worth a second thought. I am grateful to the very dear male friend who made my appointment and the other very dear male friend who loaned me part of the cash I needed and drove me the 67 miles to and from the clinic - both still my friends, both still very dear to me though I see them rarely. I am grateful to one woman in particular who was also aborting a pregnancy that day at the clinic - her second abortion: she gave me wonderful advice and comfort. I am disappointed in my female friends at the time who knew (most didn't) and avoided me like the plague, either because they disapproved of the decision or they just didn't want to deal with the crisis I was going through. And it was a crisis, in every sense of the word, and it jeopardized not only everything I had going for me at that time but my entire future. And my future matters. And I'm not going to tell you any more about the crisis that surrounded that pregnancy because IT'S NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS and because IT DOESN'T MATTER WHY A WOMAN WANTS TO ABORT A PREGNANCY. It does. not. matter. No debate, no discussion, don't even try with me.
So, yes, I aborted a pregnancy. I am grateful that I had access to services to do it. I am grateful that the drive to the clinic was just 67 miles away. I am grateful that the anti-choice, anti-women religious zealots that usually terrorize women outside of clinics took that day off. I am grateful I was able to have an appointment that allowed me to not miss the substantial obligations and immediate goals I had at that time such that no one around me ever suspected what was happening, not because I was ashamed but because I wanted to complete those obligations and goals, they meant the world to me, and I remain proud of what I was able to achieve despite having to deal with the crisis of a pregnancy and the procedure and recovery from a medical procedure - from aborting a pregnancy. I am grateful that abortion allowed me to be where I am, professionally and personally.
And I am also grateful for the time, many years later, that I think I miscarried a pregnancy before I even knew I was pregnant. The circumstances around that are also NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS.
For all of this, in a growing number of states, per the legislation they have passed, I would be a criminal if I had done these things now, as would every medical professional that participated in my abortion procedure and my friend that drove me across state lines to and from the clinic. I would also be a criminal for not reporting that miscarriage and not having a funeral for the clump of cells my body, thankfully, decided to flush out. And that's why I've chosen to share my story, because no woman who chooses to abort a pregnancy or chooses to be silent about a miscarriage should be prosecuted for anything - nor humiliated, for that matter.
Every single person reading this blog cares about someone who also happens to have needed an abortion and is GRATEFUL she was able to access that abortion. Every. Single. One. Of. You.
If you are against abortion, that's fine: don't ever have one. If you think you are "pro-life", then I look forward to your social media posts about the need for universal health care and the horror of putting children in cages and separating them from their families at the border and your support for tax increases to provide funding for rent and food assistance for women forced to quit jobs, access child care, assistance in care for children with disabilities, etc. because of forced child-bearing. I look forward to your posts about your regularly volunteering for babysitting and child care for children with disabilities so that parents can work, go to the grocery or go to medical appointments.
If these laws are even partially upheld by the Supreme Court - and with the new makeup of the court, that is very likely to happen - I will volunteer my guest room for women who want to access abortion services in Oregon and will risk crossing state lines to get it, and I will drive them to and from their abortion appointments. If that means I can never go to certain states because I would risk arrest, so be it - that's their loss, not mine.
I don't give one fuck for any friend or family member I lose contact with over this post. Buh bye. Please let the door hit you in your ass on your way out of my life.
#youknowme #ihadanabortion
I really hate my health issues being public.
I know a lot of people who are very open about their health issues - depression, cancer, surgeries, medication, whatever. I'm not at all condemning them, mostly because I often read those posts. A friend wrote emails to her friends about her cancer treatments over a few years and I learned SO much - I had no idea what certain treatments really involved, even though I'd heard the names of such many times. It was very educational for me and I appreciated it.
But no one who is going through or has gone through any illness, condition or medical treatment should ever feel obligated to share their story. I think having a root canal should be private if a person wants that to be private. And I feel the same about aborting a pregnancy. Neither are procedures someone should feel ashamed of, but the motivation for people not sharing them often doesn't come from shame - it comes from a feeling that person has that medical procedures of any kind are NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS.
That I aborted a pregnancy is none of your business. I don't have to share publicly that I aborted a pregnancy and no one else has to share that they have done so. And I've never intended to share it publicly, not because I'm ashamed of it - I am not ashamed of my abortion - but because it is NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS.
But state legislatures across the USA are working to ban the procedure of aborting pregnancies. Restricting access has been bad enough: women forced to watch videos designed to scare or shame them into canceling the appointment, waiting periods designed to make it impossible for some women to make an appointment, clinic requirements designed to make it impossible for some clinics to continue operations, etc. Those restrictions have lead to thousands of women forced to give birth, and if you think all of those stories ended with happy, healthy babies and women ultimately grateful that they carried the pregnancy to term, you live in a fantasy world - I'm the person that those women will tell, quietly, away from everyone else, that this is not a happy ending. Those restrictions on access to abortion services have NOT come with funding for pre-natal care, maternal health care, infant care, post-natal health care, rent and food assistance for women forced to quit jobs, child care, etc., so no one can say this is somehow "pro life" with any sincerity whatsoever. The bans on abortion won't come with any of that funding either.
I'm not going to tell you why I wanted an abortion because IT'S NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS. I'm not going to tell you a story that works to garner your sympathy regarding the circumstances regarding my getting pregnant or what my life was like at that time because IT'S NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS and because IT DOESN'T MATTER WHY A WOMAN WANTS TO ABORT A PREGNANCY. It does. not. matter. No debate, no discussion, don't even try with me.
So, yes, I aborted a pregnancy. I am grateful that I had access to services to do it. I am grateful that the drive to the clinic was just 67 miles away. I am grateful that the anti-choice, anti-women religious zealots that usually terrorize women outside of clinics took that day off. I am grateful I was able to have an appointment that allowed me to not miss the substantial obligations and immediate goals I had at that time such that no one around me ever suspected what was happening, not because I was ashamed but because I wanted to complete those obligations and goals, they meant the world to me, and I remain proud of what I was able to achieve despite having to deal with the crisis of a pregnancy and the procedure and recovery from a medical procedure - from aborting a pregnancy. I am grateful that abortion allowed me to be where I am, professionally and personally.
And I am also grateful for the time, many years later, that I think I miscarried a pregnancy before I even knew I was pregnant. The circumstances around that are also NONE OF YOUR FUCKING BUSINESS.
For all of this, in a growing number of states, per the legislation they have passed, I would be a criminal if I had done these things now, as would every medical professional that participated in my abortion procedure and my friend that drove me across state lines to and from the clinic. I would also be a criminal for not reporting that miscarriage and not having a funeral for the clump of cells my body, thankfully, decided to flush out. And that's why I've chosen to share my story, because no woman who chooses to abort a pregnancy or chooses to be silent about a miscarriage should be prosecuted for anything - nor humiliated, for that matter.
Every single person reading this blog cares about someone who also happens to have needed an abortion and is GRATEFUL she was able to access that abortion. Every. Single. One. Of. You.
If you are against abortion, that's fine: don't ever have one. If you think you are "pro-life", then I look forward to your social media posts about the need for universal health care and the horror of putting children in cages and separating them from their families at the border and your support for tax increases to provide funding for rent and food assistance for women forced to quit jobs, access child care, assistance in care for children with disabilities, etc. because of forced child-bearing. I look forward to your posts about your regularly volunteering for babysitting and child care for children with disabilities so that parents can work, go to the grocery or go to medical appointments.
If these laws are even partially upheld by the Supreme Court - and with the new makeup of the court, that is very likely to happen - I will volunteer my guest room for women who want to access abortion services in Oregon and will risk crossing state lines to get it, and I will drive them to and from their abortion appointments. If that means I can never go to certain states because I would risk arrest, so be it - that's their loss, not mine.
I don't give one fuck for any friend or family member I lose contact with over this post. Buh bye. Please let the door hit you in your ass on your way out of my life.
#youknowme #ihadanabortion
Friday, May 10, 2019
Definitive version of Julius Caesar - NO DEBATES!
I have seen more than a dozen productions of Shakespeare plays, live or on film. I've read several of his plays FOR FUN. Pretty good for a gal from rural Western Kentucky. Thanks to public school teachers in the Henderson County, Kentucky school system, I was introduced to a Shakespeare play in junior high school and every year after. And thanks to minoring in theater at Western Kentucky University - a minor the university will get betting rid of - my exposure to and enjoyment of the Bard continued through college. And continues to this day.
I love me some Shakespeare.
Shakespeare makes me laugh. He makes me cry. He makes me feel romantic. He reminds me of the wonder I've experienced. And the gut-wrenching sadness. He brings up topics that are buried far down in my soul, that I hope no one discovers. He's full of lofty ideas... and sex and lots of dirty jokes. He's painfully sexist and, at times, shockingly feminist. His plays are full of history and, yet, are so very timeless.
I love me some Shakespeare.
When staged, I enjoy Shakespeare plays in Elizabethan costumes, I enjoy them re-imagined in a banana republic, I enjoy women playing traditionally male parts, I enjoy the same person playing multiple parts - as long as a staged production is emotionally sincere and honest to the text, I'm good.
But I'm not always happy with productions - sometimes, the gimmicks to update the play, to make it feel fresh, can be too much, can get too contrived and feel too much like a distracting stunt - and not at all necessary.
With all that in mind, and with great trepidation, I started watching a production of Julius Caesar, set in a women's prison, as though the women prisoners are putting on the play in their prison - so it's a play within a play. I was fearing too much of a gimmick. 15 minutes in, I was completely sold on the idea, and by the time it ended, I wanted to stand up in my living room and applaud to the television and scream "Brava." At one point while watching I had to hit pause and just cry and think about what I was seeing and experiencing. There were moments I sat here in my living room, on my couch, hands over my mouth, trembling, full of every bit of the emotion I had as I watched Avenger's: End Game a couple of weeks ago. The conceptual brilliance of Phyllida Lloyd's direction and staging and the mind-blowing performance by Harriet Walter as Brutus makes this, for me, THE definitive production of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. It makes me want to go get a teaching degree just to show this to high school students in an English class. I feel like my life has been forever altered after viewing this production - seriously.
Yeah, I liked it.
If I ever meet Harriet Walter or Phyllida Lloyd, I will probably throw myself at their feet and scream "I'M NOT WORTHY TO BE IN YOUR PRESENCE."
This production was shown on PBS via Great Performances. I knew NOTHING about it before I recorded it and watched it. Since then, I've delved into the Interwebs to find out how this brilliance came to be. The setting for this production was inspired by a creative collaboration between prisoners, actors and the production team in association with the theater company Clean Break and the York St. John University Prison Partnership Project in England. I have never seen a production so well filmed, and as it's in the round, I was even further blown away. Turns out that the production was filmed on two consecutive Saturdays – one week with eight cameras on one side, the next with the cameras on the opposite side. The resulting footage was edited together over several months, together with material from GoPro cameras the actors wear at different times. The “NT Live” model of capture, with fixed cameras, would have been utterly unsatisfactory for this production.
Any viewing of Julius Caesar is particularly poignant in the USA right now: it is the acknowledgment of the fears of a dictatorship tempered with a caution about bloody revolution. I appreciate that timeless message very much - that's one of the reasons I wanted to see this, even though I've seen Julius Caesar at least twice before. I just wasn't expecting a production that was utterly mesmerizing and genius.
I'm so glad I give every month to OPB. The importance of public television and public radio cannot be denied.
I blogged about my introduction to Shakespeare, in case you are interested.
I love me some Shakespeare.
Shakespeare makes me laugh. He makes me cry. He makes me feel romantic. He reminds me of the wonder I've experienced. And the gut-wrenching sadness. He brings up topics that are buried far down in my soul, that I hope no one discovers. He's full of lofty ideas... and sex and lots of dirty jokes. He's painfully sexist and, at times, shockingly feminist. His plays are full of history and, yet, are so very timeless.
I love me some Shakespeare.
When staged, I enjoy Shakespeare plays in Elizabethan costumes, I enjoy them re-imagined in a banana republic, I enjoy women playing traditionally male parts, I enjoy the same person playing multiple parts - as long as a staged production is emotionally sincere and honest to the text, I'm good.
But I'm not always happy with productions - sometimes, the gimmicks to update the play, to make it feel fresh, can be too much, can get too contrived and feel too much like a distracting stunt - and not at all necessary.
With all that in mind, and with great trepidation, I started watching a production of Julius Caesar, set in a women's prison, as though the women prisoners are putting on the play in their prison - so it's a play within a play. I was fearing too much of a gimmick. 15 minutes in, I was completely sold on the idea, and by the time it ended, I wanted to stand up in my living room and applaud to the television and scream "Brava." At one point while watching I had to hit pause and just cry and think about what I was seeing and experiencing. There were moments I sat here in my living room, on my couch, hands over my mouth, trembling, full of every bit of the emotion I had as I watched Avenger's: End Game a couple of weeks ago. The conceptual brilliance of Phyllida Lloyd's direction and staging and the mind-blowing performance by Harriet Walter as Brutus makes this, for me, THE definitive production of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. It makes me want to go get a teaching degree just to show this to high school students in an English class. I feel like my life has been forever altered after viewing this production - seriously.
Yeah, I liked it.
If I ever meet Harriet Walter or Phyllida Lloyd, I will probably throw myself at their feet and scream "I'M NOT WORTHY TO BE IN YOUR PRESENCE."
This production was shown on PBS via Great Performances. I knew NOTHING about it before I recorded it and watched it. Since then, I've delved into the Interwebs to find out how this brilliance came to be. The setting for this production was inspired by a creative collaboration between prisoners, actors and the production team in association with the theater company Clean Break and the York St. John University Prison Partnership Project in England. I have never seen a production so well filmed, and as it's in the round, I was even further blown away. Turns out that the production was filmed on two consecutive Saturdays – one week with eight cameras on one side, the next with the cameras on the opposite side. The resulting footage was edited together over several months, together with material from GoPro cameras the actors wear at different times. The “NT Live” model of capture, with fixed cameras, would have been utterly unsatisfactory for this production.
Any viewing of Julius Caesar is particularly poignant in the USA right now: it is the acknowledgment of the fears of a dictatorship tempered with a caution about bloody revolution. I appreciate that timeless message very much - that's one of the reasons I wanted to see this, even though I've seen Julius Caesar at least twice before. I just wasn't expecting a production that was utterly mesmerizing and genius.
I'm so glad I give every month to OPB. The importance of public television and public radio cannot be denied.
I blogged about my introduction to Shakespeare, in case you are interested.
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