Hey…You…you are doing this for me. TY
❤
Author Archives: charissagrace
Speaking up for Gender Equality: “If not me, who? If not now, when?”
I don’t know why I didn’t think of reblogging this immediately!! But I dreamed about it last night, so here it is Constance.
Here is the deal with Dani…writing technique is precise and on point, intelligence and awareness informs that technique and keeps it quickened and living, topical selection is relevant and current, but more than anything else is that living throbbing sticky HEART that keeps every single one of us coming back for more.
I have been accused of being a fawning sycophant for Dani (giggle…first time in my life for that one!!)…but that is not true. The fact is she is a writer of true talent and dedicated application of that talent. Don’t believe me? Just browse back thru her posts…you’ll see. She will get you with one of her arrows, for sure.
🙂
You go, Girl, you go…and Constance, you go too over the BloomingSpiders and push “Follow”.
Love to my Sis…Charissa
❤
All that is needed for the forces of evil to triumph is for good men and women to do nothing. –Edmund Burke (1729-1797)
Image courtesy of http://www.imaginepeace.com
I turn 35 in nine days and, as is customary for this time of year, I take some heart notes on where I am and, more importantly, who I am. I’d like to say that I have it together. That I know every scar and tear in my soul’s heart, but that would be a lie. And I don’t lie. Not anymore.
This past year my thoughts have drifted over the length of who I am. I have chosen my emotional metric to be strides taken, words spoken and moments of self shared. I have looked beyond my shell to the soft center of my personhood. And there…I have found pearls. Among them sits this:
I am a woman.
And blessed to…
View original post 738 more words
ASSUMPTIONS
Constance, I simply have to comment on a photo I saw, one intended to give freedom and respect to women, by the way. I really do believe that.
But here is what is soo disheartening to me, so discouraging to me: the white board in the photo says “No Rush…whenever you are ready”. It is in reference to whenever a woman wants to have sex with any of these guys (or any guy, I guess).
Good for the realization that women are subjects with free will and intelligence and inherent worth and supreme value…but ohhhh, it broke my heart in its assumption. When a woman was going to have sex was oh so graciously ceded as her choice to make, supposedly without pressure…THAT there would be sex however, that seems to me to be just assumed as a fait accompli!
The implication to me was that a woman was still viewed as an object for sexual pleasure, just one a bit more complicated and finicky and in need of careful managing in order to pull off a successful congress.
Until such a sign is not really even thought of, there will always be the presupposition that a woman must eventually enter into sexual contact to experience validity.
I have strong feelings about sexuality which are by far in the minority these days, and I am sure that colors my reaction to the picture. But maybe it lends my point of view some credence if you imagine pics that are in reference to say going for a walk and talking about ideas and the pic says “No rush…we can walk and talk and think if you would like to do that”…
…or walking the dog: “Would you like to walk my dog with me?”
…or going to the symphony, or going to a decorative garden, or a lecture, or a movie just for, not as a prelude to anything.
I absolutely believe that a woman is in charge of her life, her destiny and who she decides to do what with and when. Nothing to dispute there…I am just lamenting assumption, and its limiting, shrinking effect on who we are.
Charissa Grace
When Did Girls Start Wearing Pink? | Arts & Culture | Smithsonian
When Did Girls Start Wearing Pink? | Arts & Culture | Smithsonian.
Constance, I just had to press this for you…a smart and informative article on the “genderfication” of the clothes. Do yourself a favor and read this…and then make the obvious leap of insight…realizing “hey…so if clothes color has been dictated by fashion, tradition, and social norm, what other aspects of gender have been dictated as well?”
Here is my current conclusion:
The awareness of gender, and who someone is seems to me to be inherent with how someone is formed in utero. Everyone has a gender awareness and identity, even if it is uncertainty. That much is there pretty much from the start.
But the expression of gender…now that is almost purely a function of societal and cultural dictates and is not at all inherent or written in stone.
Wow, that really helps us…I mean, think about how much energy it takes to be all up in everyone’s business all the time, policing them and making sure that they are conforming to your interpretation of things. If it is all just a function of your epoc, why then there is no ultimate defense you need to make to fend of the certain doom of Ragnarok the instant that you choose to simply take logs out of your own eye and leave the sawdust in other people’s eyes alone.
Happy Birthday Dearest Darling
to write a poem for you
is to make one snowflake out
to be an avalanche.
there is beauty in the snowflake,
unsurpassed, unique, breathtaking.
that flake comes from no where,
appears, and returns
to where it came
without leaving a trace,
except in me
tattooed by glory…
except in my heart,
where i am cut forever
by that shape exquisite,
where i am cooled always
in the stark clarifying
fiercely cheerful clear cold,
where my heart makes
that perfect simulacrum of that
impossibly beautiful flake
over and over again
with the dripping blood
welling from my heart
cut by you, that cut, that flake.
an avalanche
began that day,
that day the light
danced up my battlements
and captured my eyes
forever in your dazzle,
an avalanche of
one flake persistent,
one flake present
in deserts and monsoons
and fierce fires
of the coldest frozen sorrow.
you,
my ever-fire,
my ever-ice,
soothing and searing,
and impossibly yourself
i love you
more than all my tears
multiplied by all the tears
of every person
multiplied by the distance
east is from west
and added to itself again.
i love you
more than every laugh
that’s tumbled gleeful
from my lips, and
i love you
more than every piercing longing,
poignant and unspeakable
if you hadn’t come
i would be there hanging, high
on the side of the mountain
stark and slate
in morning light.
i would be that
field of billions
of unique flakes settled
all the same and piled
into meaningless multiplied
unified snowy sameness,
still and without motion.
but you did.
come.
and that has
made my world
alive.
love forever,
and i mean forever
Charissa Grace,
your undying heart devoted
I miraculously have a couple of these! (Correction: HAD)
“The best kind of people are the ones that come into your life, and make you see the sun where you once saw clouds.
The people that believe in you so much, you start to believe in you too.
The people that love you, simply for being you.
The once in a lifetime kind of people.”
Me? I just make one up and I am good to go!
Et si je vous aime…
Et si je vous aime d’instants pluriels
C’est sans doute que les rêves s’évadent
Aux voluptés des amours essentiels
Que j’oublie qui je suis au bord du ciel
Quand la nuit s’étend comme une cascade
Mon elle se froisse aux désirs charnels
Et ma moitié s’élève en embrassade.
Et si je vous aime d’instants pluriels
C’est d’audace que les pensées paradent
D’un exil prudent , d’un dernier appel
Que l’encore claque aux sens textuels
Les yeux s’égarent, l’île se dérobe,
Mélangées les cambrures se torsadent
Au rythme essoufflé d’un baiser mortel
Et l’aube s’attarde aux corps sensuels
D’un vertige effeuillant une tornade.
Et si je vous aime d’instants pluriels….
Mystic4Ever
Le 21 Juillet 2011
Ce texte est la propriété de Mystic4Ever Tous droits réservés ©
The Courageous Debi Jackson
Constance, I am posting here a speech given by Debi Jackson…it speaks for itself very well. Debi is a woman who loves God, loves people, and has a transgender daughter whom she is championing in a way that I am totally certain makes Mama proud.
Please check it out and let your heart be encouraged that hate can never ever conquer.
Debi…from me my deepest thank you’s and admirations for making a way for your child.
If only…if only…
Love, Charissa
10 Ways Introverts Interact Differently With The World
10 Ways Introverts Interact Differently With The World.
My bff and I just had a convo about these things…it is amazing how many of them we touched on. Thanks DDH!!
Constance, how about it…do you identify? Even more importantly, do these observations have any implication in terms of how we should then live?
D’Eve vouée ….
O mon vain cœur, mon compagnon de je docile
Avec toi tout en moi, tout semble si facile
Tu es le rire dans mes yeux traversés d’eau
La candeur de ma plume et mon porte drapeau.
Quand la nuit s’étend et que ton sommeil me prend
Tu es dans mes rêves , tu respires mon sang
Veillant sur mes émois, adulant mes stigmates
Même la lune semble aimer tes soies délicates.
Et quand au petit jour, tu lèves mes nuages
Mon ciel paraît plus bleu livrant un doux présage
Une belle journée à charge en marge du temps
Quand en fil conducteur, tu « miracles « le tant.
Je t’aime, tu le sais, comme à nul autre pareil
Je te dois chacun de mes vers couleur vermeil
Je te vois et te sens partout chaque seconde
Pour toi en secret, j’aimerai traverser l’onde.
Parfois tu m’échines à en mourir d’envie
Ironique et fragile aux touches de la vie
Tu ébranles mes pas me rendant orpheline
D’un jamais à moi ta fille de mousseline.
Quand je mêle ta voie pour écrire un poème
Tu susurres que tu es enfant de bohème
Alors je sublime une à une tes absences
Car qui mieux que tes chants connaissent mes silences.
O mon vain cœur, mon compagnon de je docile
Avec toi tout en moi, tout semble si facile
Même si parfois tu fais défaut à mes vœux lourds
Je te suis dévouée depuis toujours,Toi l’Amour……
Mystic4Ever
Le 24 Juin 2011
Ce texte est la propriété de Mystic4Ever Tous droits réservés ©
This Ghost Poetic
I wander this world ghost-like
in poetic places, like a phantom
passing thru unseen, unfelt.
I wonder in the presence all around…I see, I feel…
I dwell in mists, resarciate revelation,
in the clear and frosty glow of iridescent knowings
and I vibrate with the rhythms and the meters of forever…
and yet…and yet…and yet I have no body to encounter anything.
How it is that I cannot touch that rock, that tree, that river?
Oh it’s not for lack of trying! No, it’s not for lack of crying out
until my throat is torn and sundered by the torrents of
poetic whispers midst the thunder booming in the heart beat of the ocean!
Blue and silver tinged in crimson rushing furious from deep
inside my belly and into the deserts stretched around me desolate…
and bleeding wet across the dry rocks stacked in careless ruination
like a giant game of pick-up sticks, I flow…
I water this ground thirsty, this land burnt and deaf and hungry!
I see dwellers in the dust and so I run to them
in glad and eager assignations, to speak waters cold and clear
in dulcet tones delightful…but I’m stunned, disheartened and confused
because my waters glad, my torrents true blue in their striking mercies
simply pass right thru them, as if they were ghostly manes,
mere spirit rivers, haunted waters!
I have no solid being in this non poetic world!
I am eidolic without body! I am eidolon!
And I rush at them in hot frustration, I fly at them with fists poetic
windmilling the haunted air like stinging butterflies and then
I see that glass jaw of untruth just jutting forth in pride,
I see those flabby dull and paunchy souls and rain down blows
like honey bees dive bombing wooly bears below…
and stand and watch in horror as my fists, my quick poetic fists
of thunder-boom and stormy rant
(and lightning laced with baby breath and MamaSong)
just pass right thru…without a trace.
That’s when it hits me, I’m the phantom in this place!
I’m a ghost poetic without body,
save my words which have no presence
save their spectral wraithy breeze
as they pass thru the dwellers in the land of Nod!
And then I weep, and see my tear drops fall straight thru the carmine earth
and out the other side to float in space like stars unhinged from Mama’s eyes.
…But once in a while I hurt my hand!
Because I see that tree, that rock,
that mountain, that sea and I swing
with all my might so desperate
to make contact, connect but glum
expecting that it will be just
another sickening stomach churning
free-fall thru and without touching
anything that makes a difference
and gives me substantial presence
that I yearn for unrequited,
always unrequited…
…Once in a while…BAM! That tree is THERE!
And oh, that mountain in the air
hits back with all its mountain might
and I break open and pour poetry from knuckles
barked and ripped and dripping bloody meaning.
So I walk, proceed with caution and with people,
careful not to punch with fists, but swing with kisses blown poetic
and with whispers strewn so pretty in the paths of maybe-solid
peace that feet can walk upon and crush the petals
of my life poetic, thus releasing such sweet fragrance
of that Mystery Lurking Beyond Wonders.
And while I walk, I have been wondering…
what if I am not a ghost? What if I am real, and walk
a world of trees so solid, mountains stark and clouds so soft,
so touchable and trembling singable and trodable
in skies so blue and thick with skin like opal seas?
What if it’s not me the wraith but everything around me
that’s unsound and apparitional, haunted, insubstantial?
What if I’m the solid one and live inside a singing body
solid and substantial in its meter, rhyme and rhythm?
What if I walk a world of ghosts within this body poetic,
and with dactylic soul still singing ever in exquisite
anapestic harmony and twine my song with river-chorus
in the currents of the Milky Way so high and flowing ever
from my Mama’s ruby loving lips?
What if it’s because my fists’ poetic swinging, punching,
on the rocks relentless pounding on the trees
until they gain their being solid and substantial,
bit by bit and flake by swing, whiff by hook they reel
into reality and become present, incarnated to wear atoms
for their royal robes piled high and gold with poems now glorified?
What if my words, passing thru them like the winds wind thru tree branches
leaving something solid, something real that feels good to inhabit,
what if my heart poetry is giving walls and floors and roofs and doors
to enter in and stay and take on body, soul, and spirit?
I am a ghost poetic,
I’m a poem in a ghost world.
I am a song unseen and spectral,
I am heard in opened ears.
I am a difference that I long for
and a solid longed for morsel.
I’m a river in the desert
and a cool cup of sweet water
and a riddle-paradox
of ghost-words become manifest
and incarnated in the bloody
hearts of listeners and hungry
mouths of singers
and the happy souls
of Mama’s children.
Kitty-Quote of the day
The Last Faint Spark
Constance, this devotional is by my favorite devotional writer Jill Carattini, and rather than copy and past it I decided to press it…
…and then copy out a poem here that she quotes. I was stunned by this poem…and Constance? You think I write poems?? *charissa laffs and shakes her head in wonder at the thought*
No, dear Constance…this is what a real poem, a grown up poem looks like!! Just wow.
Andrea Gibson Performs ‘Privilege Is Never Having to Think About It’ — Everyday Feminism
Andrea Gibson Performs ‘Privilege Is Never Having to Think About It’ — Everyday Feminism.
Constance…this is a great post, and should make you think. The link takes you to a performance…I am posting the poem here in transcript form, and the decisions about line breaks are mine…if it is good, credit to Andrea Gibson and if it is bad blame to me.
Give some thinking about privilege, cus chances are, all of us who have WordPress Blogs likely do indeed have some privilege as well…but I will let you figure out how that works!
Charissa Grace
This poem has two working titles. It might end up having five working titles.
The first one is “Privilege Is Never Having to Think About It.”
And the second one is “Touring with a Black Poet: For Sonya Renee.”
She steps out
of the hotel bathroom dressed to the nines —
stilettos sharp in her glossy, glossy,
elegant, tailored, boom glittering,
a bold burgundy neckline —
locks her shining eyes on the worn t-shirt
I haven’t changed in days and says,
“Are you going to wear that on stage?”
I smile,
gloating in the cool of my gritty apathy,
the oh-so-thrift-store of my dirty grunge.
She says, “honey, do you have any idea
how much privilege it takes
to think it is cool to dress poor?
You wear that dirty shirt;
you are a radical saving the world.
I wear that dirty shirt,
and I am a broke junkie thief
getting followed around every store.”
That conversation happened years ago.
On the same tour where Sonya watched
me pay 75 bucks to have my hair
cut in a way that would make me look
like — quote — like
“I couldn’t afford a haircut.”
The same tour that began
the day after I was the feature performer
at a university’s women of color symposium.
No, I did not ask whether or not
featuring a woman of color instead.
Yes, I got paid. I’m pretty sure it was a good paycheck.
Just like
I’m pretty sure someone licked the paycheck
when Trayvon Martin’s gun range targets
got sold out in two days.
I know those things are not exactly the same
I know I wanted to burn
every noose white seam of our cotton flag
when Trayvon Martin’s mother
was on the witness stand
trying to convince a jury
of mostly white mothers that
she could actually recognize
the sound of her own son’s scream.
I know I wanted to
split the fucking sky
when I heard
the whip of the verdict
and Sonya had posted online,
“How many different ways
can this country tell me
I am worthless?”
I know it was right then
that I walked upstairs and started counting
the hoodies in my closet. I have fourteen hoodies
that tell me I will never be forced
to dress a wound as deep as my mother’s heart.
She will never be woken in her sleep
to peel my body off gated grass,
to beg God to sew the hole in my chest.
I know my family will never
have to hear justice, say it wasn’t
until I was lying in my casket
that I was wearing the right clothes.
I know a woman
who once knew a woman
who collected the metal collars
they used to lock around
the necks of black children
to chain them to the auction block.
I was told
she hung them
on the walls of her home
for decoration.
I remember when I used to believe
that was the entire definition of racism.
Believed there was no one
hanging in my wardrobe.
Believed my style
had nothing in common
with king Leopold’s.
Thought I am not
outfitting the Congo
in spilled blood.
I am just buttoning up my shirt here.
I am just rolling up my sleeves.
I am not unstitching the face of Emmett Till.
I am not unzippering the wail of his mother’s grief.
The laces of my shoes are just the laces of my shoes.
They could not tie a body to a tree.
I am not fashioning a noose here.
Sonya, do you hear me?
My compassion is not a costume.
My passivity is not hate.
My privilege is not genocide.
This is just how I cut my hair.
That was just how they cut the check.
This is just how I dress.
Your wound.
I don’t even think about
what I wear.
Days and Nights and Nesting Dolls
We walked in that old thrift shop musty,
dingy light seeping around stacked shag carpets
and formica tables piled high with bakelight plates.
It smelled of dried rain and wet mildew.
It beckoned us luridly, promising hidden treasures
squirreled away in dank depths and skinny aisles
piled high and tippling.
Your eyes glinted with purpose and glee
like Sherlock Holmes on the case,
so I resigned myself, Watson-like,
to the chase and followed
your dashing red boiled wool coat
and white fuzzy stocking cap deeper in
to the belly of this lazing laughing thrift whore—err—store.
And sure enough your squeak of discovery
morphed into a squeal of delight
and you held up your find like Aphrodite
holding up her heart to Adonis’ ruby thirsty gorgeous lips,
and you possessed, moved demi detourné
and grinned gleeful in the tight aisle
when changement you spun to hand me
your thrifty trove plunder…wait…
Russian nesting doll?
“Oh Charissa!!” You spoke softly
but your sotto voce rang in my heart booming
cus you know that place big and special
that only you live in and call my Lady’s Chamber…
“It’s soo you!” You cooed and fussed in total committed certainty
that this odd intricacy was me.
It was wood, golden glossy with painted folksy face
…and it was male?? Wait. Whaaaat is…?
You saw me, my confusion in this
the only time in my living memory
you had paid this shell more than
the passing glance and haughty sniff
we all share at how uncooperative
our bodies can be, and your smile
more tender than all the leaves of every Beech and Birch under the moon.
“Oh Sweetie, let me tell you…these dolls…you…well,
there is a history here, right?
Tradition carves these, dolls within the dolls within the dolls
until the core and look! Just open it up, ‘kay?”
My eyes were blurry and my nose felt raw
rubbed in rough coarse handkerchief flesh
oversized and clumsy and inside my lil toes
throbbed hard in hurt stomped ache
from what you had not done ever
and yet had brandished that day
in triumphant tinkling delight…
but behind your insistent excitement
I saw awareness, I saw your pleading strong
ask of my trusting heart open to you
there and waiting…
So I took it, I felt
its smooth warm grain
inviting and fairly singing
of mystery and glad discovery
and with a last foreboding look
at your face illumined I twisted it open
to find the waiting center was another doll like the first
and painted gaily and it was female…
and when I looked inquiring
if I should open it too,
your fierce nod was
in time to the trembling
of my hands as meaning
washed me and when
I twisted it open
the skritch of the wood turning
sang together with your
smothered cry of joy in me…
..and I saw the small girl I am
but never was and inside
the baby whole and of one piece…
“See?? I told you, Charissa! It’s SOO you!”
And with that, you pushed past me
like winds pushing past the windmills
and me turning in your wake
to follow you to the place
of purchase and presentation.
I sit and stare at those dolls…
I remember that day when you were here
and our short time was forever and our poor spouses weary
from our fevered pursuits so fueled by that find
and so eager for our next parable-mystery tracked out…
and all the days since, and
who knew that so many dolls
could fit in so many days?
So many you’s in me and me’s in you
as we walked us the streets of life together
and laughed our way deeper inside
from me to you and back to me,
and us, nested there within.
Charissa the Introvert
I know, I know…I can hear the squeal of mental brakes locked up, smell the smouldering acrid heat of belts spinning fast on cogs that are jammed and won’t move…did Charissa just say she is an introvert???
Giggle…believe it or not, I am indeed.
So, before I get to my point, I want to preface with this:
I love what my friend Dani writes of and speaks of when she mentions icebergs as a phenomena and metaphor for seeing and understanding what you see. She points out that the vast majority of an iceberg is under the surface, regardless of what is visible on the surface. She then has sort of developed this teaching moment for her readers, derived from her own life practice, and instructs us to understand that we must intention to see, and in that intentionality we can see what we don’t see…granting credence, respect, inferring presence and thus legitimacy to something more, something that exists and extends beyond our own way of defining it.
I think it is this intentionality of being and granting being that informs Dani’s writing and thus infuses it with such potency and presence. And it is also what enables her to see me, something that is a literal miracle to me but the scope of which far exceeds this forum’s ability to reflect or contain.
Anyway, I am an introvert, in that all that is visible is really not that much compared to the things unseen in me, unsaid by me, and unacted on thru me. I have tried to build in an “airlock” in me…a space thru which I try to pass all things before they exit or enter me.
I am much better at filtering the things I allow out than the things I allow in! But I am working on that!
So this post was stimulated by the quote below:
“One of the risks of being quiet is that the other people can fill your silence with their own interpretation:You’re bored. You’re depressed. You’re shy. You’re stuck up. You’re judgmental.When others can’t read us, they write their own story—not always one we choose or that’s true to who we are.”
— Sophia Dembling’s The Introvert’s Way
I think that is what goes on in a lot of ways with a lot of people…and it was an insight moment for me in regards to my dementors. They simply must settle things, and settle them in the way that makes them feel–what? Authentic? Present? Solid? Justified? Affirmed? Secure? Any of those things can drive dementing.
I want to go ya one further: even when it is more benign and less toxic, less radioactive and destructive, the small, daily banal ways that we do this “defining” of others can really be a source of a lot of alienation and separation. The ways we look at our spouse when they are quiet, and we want to know what is up…or the way we imagine our friend when we haven’t heard anything…or the way we speculate on the inside of our teenager’s brain…it might be the one greatest source of separation between people there is…and the truly sad thing is that most of the time the motives are fairly benign!
So…give another go to the quote, and really chew it. Then give some more thought to Dani’s beautiful practice of Intentionality…and then lastly, see what you see, and see what you see by what is unseen!
Love Charissa
“Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward being is perishing, yet the inward person is being renewed day by day.
“For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen.
“For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal.”
Sands and Shadows and Pearls
I do shed tears, these days
(and nights…it is strange to wake
and find the wet residue of sorrows
dried and digging at the corners of my eyes),
I also shed dreams too
(like tears).
I dreamed, last night
(last night…it is strange to wake
and find the dry remnants of dreams
moist and pressed, pushing into the spaces between me and my pillow),
I also shed tears too
(like dreams).
I think…yes.
I dreamed that I walked lands crying
and my tears fell on red sands glistening
(my tears glistening, not the sands, they lay leering, skulking, glaring flat and angry).
my tears
(the ones in my dreams, the ones with no shadow)
my tears on red sands sizzled
because I had no shadow, they had no shadow
(the tears and me, not the sands and dreams)
and then in that glaring sun unbridled, that staring star unfiltered
they (my tears) became pearls
of white
and ivory
and pink
(like the armpits of abalones, who also learned to live without shadows)
they
(my tears, not the abalones, or the red sands, or the shadows)
became pearls of My Mother, the Mother of Pearls
(born of tears shed on red sands glaring, tears glistening and without shadow)
and then I saw, Her (not shadows or sands) walking there,
sowing in tears and reaping in pearls with nary a diamond in sight
(because diamonds have shadows and slinky songs and glittery platinum brittle best friends)
and She turned to me, She bid me pick them up
(the pearls, not sands and shadows)
and take…eat…and I did and where they lay the sand was gone
(like shadows flee daylight)
and green grass jumped lush into my eyes with verdant glee!
And the pearls tasted like honey
(and clear thirst-quenching shadow-clearing life)
and the pearls became glory within me
and I rose up on glory, I rose up in glory,
glory within me and glory in the air
(and the pearls of my Mother, not the sands and shadows)
and I saw my shadow, distant and crumpled and pinned to the ground
for always by arrows and spears and the knives
of those children of red sand and shadows.
And just as I began to wake
I realized that ever would they gather there,
around that shadow pinned and empty of all save their vitriol and hate
while I walked free but achy across the red sands, with no shadow
between me and that stark sun except for the glory
that’s given by pearls plucked from green grass so verdant
that used to be red sand hot
on which was shed precious
tears without shadow.
So I wake, each time
(not to day, not in night, I wake to me)
I wake and realize I do not need a shadow
to stand between me and the sun and some something
to tell me that I am, I am.
I just need those tears
shed on sands red and glaring
become pearls from my Mother
to wrap me in glory and glory wrapped in me
and no shadow
my shadow forever
WWJD: What Would Jesus Do? Do You Really Want to Know? | Mick Mooney
I think this is what someone who cares for me is trying to say…
“Intimacy is not who you let touch you.
Intimacy is who you text at 3am about your dreams and fears.
Intimacy is giving someone your attention, when ten other people are asking for it.
Intimacy is the person always in the back of your mind, no matter how distracted you are.”
God knows the horrors of assumption, and as is my mantra, forgive me my presumption such as it is.
This is my heart of hearts trying to yelp (See Horton Hears a Who) and break out of the cloud of unknowing that smothers and socks in with the fog of self-loathing.
You are there, always, in the back of my mind.
I SOO love the exposure of the entitlement thinking here…
the following photo was take in 1937 and captioned as follows:
In 1937 two women caused a car accident by wearing shorts in public for the first time
I read the following comment on a site where I just spotted this:
No they didn’t. The man driving his car who took his eyes off the road because he was staring at a pair of women caused a car crash. He averted his eyes from the road, he endangered other people and he crashed his own car. This is all the proof you need that we live in a society that blames women for things they didn’t do.
Constance…your assignment for today: think of all the ways that we blame shift in our society…because blame-shifting is such a common thing for humans to do anyway (hey, see Genesis: the woman blames the snake, and then Adam blames the woman, and then blames God too…).
But there are huge ways we do that culturally…rape is a good one to look at. Ways that people are either empowered with entitlement in shifting blame to women for being raped, or ways that women are violated even deeper in that they are made responsible for their own violation.
Race is another one…and the issue of “driving while black, walking while black, or fill in the blank while black” and how police authorities then blame-shift their own hatred, or fear, or whatever onto the ones they brutalize.
Religion is another, and it is a veritable tennis match as haters on both sides shift viscous volleys of blame back and forth from “those damned liberals” to “those ignorant fundies”.
And now that you are warmed up…how about just lil old you? How do you blame shift onto others? (Charissa will not comment regarding her own woodshedding with Mama regarding that Q)
The Last 33 Years…
“You teach people how to treat you by what you allow, what you stop, and what you reinforce.”
| — | Tony Gaskins |
…seem very different to me when I view them thru these glasses…god what have I done to myself, and how do I undo it?
Messages Off a Cigarette – Draught | calliopes lyre
Messages Off a Cigarette – Draught | calliopes lyre.
This one I decided to press, rather than reblog…wander on over to Cookie’s blog, won’t you? I know I am much the richer because of it, and quite a lot of the pain that I had no words for (omg, yes, imagine that! CHARISSA has no words????) she managed to tap into and say for me…
…and for that measure of relief, I am grateful. It is like a thumb push on the morphine pump of hope to keep me going.
Frankly, I Wonder If I Stand a Chance
“It takes years as a woman to unlearn what you have been taught to be sorry for.”
| — | Amy Poehler in Yes Please |
Confessions
I sit here, like my robin there,
watching the geese overhead
in their socially aware V
pointing all together and chattering
in honking gasps of glory and gathering.
My robin looks up,
head cocked and eye a-glitter
and wonders what the hub bub is all about…
and also wonders why she sits,
alone and remaining
as the wind grows chill
and the sky grows grey
and the air grows still
as the more social birds
gather up and leave together
on soft grey southern wings.
Didn’t we used to all trill and honk
and tweet and cheep together?
And I came everyday eager to the yard,
to flit and look for bugs and worms and seeds…
but now? As the leaves have left
and the geese are leaving
and the cats still lurk in black slashes
of slink and dash and calico camouflage
patterns against the browning grass?
I really don’t understand
this community thing
when I show up
everyday in the yard,
but worms taste
wriggly and gritty
without any company.
Maybe the high rock raptors
had it right all along,
maybe solitary unconfinement
was better than that
surface social refinement?
And then the robin
swells her breast with breath,
quivers behind her black bright eye,
and takes wing to fly,
and make her moves
around the growing absence
in the winter neighborhood waiting
until the spring once again
brings those members in the moment
noisy and social, and hell bent
on the seeds and bugs of the verdant yard.
I’m attracted to trans women – Salon.com
I’m attracted to trans women – Salon.com.
I am pressing this, Constance, because it is the chronicle of the courage of a person to explore the dynamics and politics of gender in a world that is gradually moving from ignorance into enlightenment in this area.
No…this does not mean that I want to date men.
No…this does not mean that I want to date women either! Quite simply, gender and sexuality intersect only to the degree that the individual person connects them, they are not inextricably joined at the hip!
All desire to date anyone disappeared from within me the literal instant my eyes saw my beloved. She is my “sexual orientation”…She is my “sexual preference”…I don’t know if I would have seen her if she was male-bodied, but now that I have lived with her these last decades, well it would not matter to me what body she had…she is herself, and forever my one and only love.
Just wanted to mention that because of the coming crap storm from my self-appointed “lovers of the sinner” who will say that I am (fill in the blank from their fetid minds and sordid imaginations and black hearts)…
Nope, none of that, I want you to please read the thoughtful intelligent steps of courage of a human being.
It is only circumstance that I met my beloved before dealing with my gender issues…who knows how the struggle would have been? And that is why the issue must be grappled with. Each person needs love and someone to love…even transgender people.
Charissa
PS: I just noticed that this article appeared in a different form at this link:
Defeating Shame: My Story of Trans-Attraction
It is just enough different as to be interesting.
10 questions to never ask a transgender person by Laura Jane Grace
I found this online, Constance. It is not mine:
The Ears of the deaf
All music sounds alike to the ears of the deaf.
Charissa White
The Evil Entitlement Mantle of Men
This is outrageous. I am sick of it, frankly…the answer that comes…each and every time…a woman is shot for resisting a man’s advances, a transwoman is killed for walking trans, a woman is beaten because she didn’t like the man’s catcalling…
…and each and every time comes the hot refrain “not all men”. And in that outrage comes the self-exoneration to take any responsibility whatsoever to change this absolute plague that is indeed of epidemic proportion. Women are treated like property, and around the globe like garbage.
Reminds me of Lot, who was looking for even 5 good men to ask God to stay His hand from destroying the cities so deeply inculcated in evil that they were beyond saving…after the evil was cut away nothing remained…
…modern man looking for some men somewhere who haven’t done this so they can continue to think of us as cattle, as property, as garbage, as objects existing to meet their needs and they the only judge and arbiter of what a need is and when it is and why it is and woe to you woman if you didn’t realise that the need changed you simply must be taught a lesson.
Every single male out there reading this: I have walked in your spaces unseen, and I know your thoughts and rationalizations and reasons and excuses and the way that very quickly into encountering a rant like mine this morning you smile and go to a happy place inside where the mantra runs something like “crazy-bitch alert, must be hormonal, humor the lil woman, must remember to bring flowers to distract her”…
…and then the discussions among yourselves of how she brought it on herself with her (fill in the blank)…
If you are reading this while male, then you are responsible to begin changing this, and doing so with vigor. You are the one with power. You are the one who can confront men without getting what I just wrote or a fist in the face. LISTEN: we don’t want what you HAVE…we want to be WHO we ARE! And what is truly pathetic is that you are blind to how much better you will be for it.
I know, I know…you don’t see it. My face has been in danger of being permanently blue from arguing with men and them resorting to slut shaming me (and this was before they even knew I was trans!) because I was imagining things…they remind me of fish in water with gills who claim that they have no special power whatsoever just because they can breathe in water.
Well, we have lungs and live on land…fishes! Try coming out of the water and walking in our world! Yeah, choking a bit, aren’t you?
What I am trying to say is that you need to look soberly at your participation in the rape and abuse and enslavement and othering and dehumanizing of half of the image of God. And if you have any integrity or guts, begin to walk different, talk different, and be different.
I wonder what a true man looks like, one who would treat me as a subject because I am in God’s Image, and not as an object because I am in Hugh Hefner’s image (or in derision because I with my transgender testosterone wrecked monstrosity called a body am not)?
So just in case you think I am fantasizing…
I got tired of printing screen, but I could have gone on…the rest of the day…and tomorrow too.
Men, you say good things happen all the time from men to women?
Prove it.
Start with not raping us. beating us…no wait! This is even easier…pay us the same amount of money for the same work, and give us access to the same jobs and positions. Leave the safety of the lil boys clubs and walk in the world as men who are committed to using their strength and guts to place others above themselves.
Do Justice. Love Mercy. Walk Humbly.
Charissa
PS: I just have to share this funny: I just said something to my baby about how the Entitlement Mantle is the evil perversion of the Harry Potter Invisibility Cloak!! lol
“What are you complaining about? We have to run the same distance as you, so it’s equal!” (seen online)
21 Gun Salute
They stood there,
silhouetted against the sunrise
and rifles aimed, at me
silhouetted against the velvet dark
of dawning and birth and being,
silhouetted against that red brick wall.
21 guns, barrels like unblinking eyes,
black, flat depths unblinking too
and peering from their graves
in grim unfeeling determination
to put me in my place,
put me in my grave,
put me back with them.
There are 3 bullets among them,
the 21 guns staring unblinking and grim,
and they comfort themselves with lies
that they do not know who has the bullets…
but I do, I know, I see
the silver winking bright
in the unblinking barrels
once (Father!)
twice (Forgive them!)
thrice (They know not what they do!)
And then the lightning struck
in those volleys of thunder raining down
over my ears as my eyes went bright
and my vision streaked red and silver
in terror and tragic tremour and
violent shuddery release.
It knocked me out of my shoes
and pinned my shadow against that
smooth red brick wall, now pitted
three times pitiless and gaping,
and I felt funny somehow, floating there,
hanging light and airy, somehow too light
without my shadow, crumpled
and remaining nailed
to brick and beam
by palm and palm and foot
and those empty shoes, kicked akimbo
by my eager rushing exit from that place.
Right under their noses!
I rose up unseen
while they stared on
in horror and resignation
except for the three
who leered in hungry glee
and desperate jealous lusty thirst.
But for just a bit, I stayed,
to move from gun to gun
and kiss the barrels each one cold
(and 3 so hot and acrid)
and then I began to rise and leave,
when I heard some flat dead zombie voice say
“get that thing out of here and clean this mess up”.
I saw that it was one of them,
a former being who was
a current corporate walking dead
(but hey, see this company credit card?)
and dressed
in shoes and sunglasses
and lumpy
in the dawn’s early light
and I couldn’t tell
what was more offensive:
my shoes skewed
sideways and useless
or my shadow
pinned and unmoving?
I shed one celestial tear
and rose up on the sound
of 21 flat cracks still ringing
and I leapt graceful
on feet bare and light
from sounds of wrong
to sounds of ever right
and found my wings
midst the flurry of sound and fury
and flew away for good
to a 21 gun salute.
This Drifty-Floaty Timeless Moment
Hanging here,
this moment,
this drifty-floaty
timeless moment,
timeless
like the moment just before
a leaf decides to let go
but the tree doesn’t yet know it,
so it waits, the leaf, it waits
to leave and never return.
It’s this moment, still,
between determined faith and action,
between sharp heart felt questions
(like whether God loves me or tolerates me, or cares or hears my prayers or is even near?)
and dark deep-felt screaming
despair unquestioning running
ragged and burning in flames
undulating from faith to action
shoving hard against paralysis.
This drifty floaty
timeless moment
lingers, lurches,
lunges, becomes
that drifty floaty
timeless movement
torn loose,
tossed down
spinning down
pinwheeling down
and it drops, it drifts,
it breaks and crashes, it dashes
into a thousand brilliant colors
and a million diamond drops
each and everyone shouting forever
I was!
I was, in my birth,
and I am!
I am in my courage
and I will be!
I will be
in the sea
and its salty desire, in the dirt
and its brown gritty tang,
in tree roots drawn up liquid again
from the ground to the limbs thru the leaves there to breathe
and to fly up and shine
in the glowing deep night
in the twinkle and tingling cold there to
glitter and shimmer like silver elixir
for seraphim thirsty in splendour…
slaking the thirst of angels…
stoking desire in God…
then, now
someday, now,
hanging in this moment
midst the fragrances of hope
and stormy lightning-strike ozone
stark and fresh and scintillating
in the stillness of the moment,
of the drifty-floaty moment
before movement,
this drifty-floaty timeless moment
This is one of those times for me…
…and it scares me, for realz!!
Our Paris, our Pretty Poetic Paris
Good morning Constance…and Pamela! 🙂
If you have been reading here a while you will know that I was sooo blessed by Mama to run across Lynda Bullerwell…her site is over at forget-me-not .
I am continually amazed by her poetry and the truly significant and moving poems she writes. But even more, I have been amazed and warmed and felt such connection in how it is as if we share the same muse, a flitty lil fairy of the realm Poetic who loves to sprinkle her magic pixie-poety dust upon us each, and then scrape if off and sprinkle the mix onto each other!
There have been times when we wrote nearly the exact same poem, and yet it had different clothes on, and revolved around different images, but it was still the same one…and lately for me, as I have been choked by sorrow, burdened by betrayal and assaulted by online a-holes, Lynda has been my surrogate, and has written out my own hurts and haunts and hallelujahs.
I am ever so grateful…company in this life, especially in inner spaces that had always been solitary territories, is such a gift, such a precious gift.
Lynda wrote a poem yesterday, which just pulled a comment out of me as if I had been with her in the poem’s conception and making. It tumbled out of me breathless and intoxicated and full of determination to tattoo itself to our outside skin just as Lynda’s poem had tattooed itself inside our heart.
Lynda loved it (thank you for that, Sis), and suggested that I post the comment…and I thought that a collaborational moment may even be better? She loved that too.
So here is our poem…hers, and mine. I am taking liberties with her lines and meter. Any deficiences therein are my mistakes, and any glories revealed were already there.
PS: Lynda, if it just simply cannot work for you, let me know and I will put it in its original form, which is just fine! It was the collaborative notion that appealed to me!
Love, Charissa
❤
Our Paris, our Pretty Poetic Paris
(Our, our Poetic)
We could visit Paris, walk in the rain
without an umbrella and sit
on the steps of Eglise Saint-Etienne-du-Mont
when the clock strikes twelve and we are back
in that club rubbing shoulders with Hemingway;
shots of wisdom swirling in cocktail glasses
with cherries, olives or whatever you fancy;
culture parading its diversity
in paintings by Picasso
that make you take a second look
and wonder where a mind could go
to find such muse, blue and clearer than sea water,
these syllables that taunt you in your sleep,
weigh on you in vibrant colors of indigo, azure;
scents of lavender filling pretty stationary
tempting you to write, scratching you
from the inside, these words dying to escape
from pink painted lips that only
want to feel that last goodnight kiss.
TWO: Post-Midnight Aperitifs
(Paris, Pretty Paris)
…but when my limpid pen stirred
to stroke across the paperskin, to move
light mountains like what we saw, it only
squeaked with dry throat and trembled
…oh that wine, it made me laff and you
looked so CUTE with that escargot, and omg
did our sexy waiter actually brush your arm???
and hey thanks for that lil white flower,
truth is it breaks my heart
more than this Picasso guy, cus he’s no Van Gogh…
…and your laughing lullabye to me last nite
as we slept, you there, and me here,
our stockings half on half off, in
our intoxicated heady cuvée
of life and grape and sea and garden
and you silly songed me to sleep…
…but i most of all loved when
you saw him, Hemingway and pointed
him out to me and me drunk just a scosh,
I said he looked like Hawmingway
cus he hemmed and hawed so much
trying to figure out if he wanted to be brave or to be dead
…and you cackled like the gypsy woman did when we
put those silly hats on our heads backwards and sideways
while we lingered at her table there in the street
and she spelled the money out of our purses
…most of all I loved that…
cus you made me feel brave and knowing
that i was vital and alive and would never die
no matter how tired and sleepy i eventually get.
Love, your companion in our Paris,
our Principality of Poetry in
our Province of Wonder…
your co-conspiritor Charissa,
Sis
10 Things You’re Actually Saying When You Ignore Someone’s Gender Pronouns — Everyday Feminism
10 Things You’re Actually Saying When You Ignore Someone’s Gender Pronouns — Everyday Feminism.
Constance…immediately pass this on to every stubborn person who is important to you. It is that good, and it does give the basic and true message communicated by those who refuse to use proper pronouns.
I know in my life? So unfortunate, but the people that I love, was willing to sacrifice for and even die a bit for, well, they did not feel the same way about me and they engaged in terrible acts of betrayal.
So, weirdly, it set me free.
Now? Well, thanks to them, and my wonderful horrible very own haters who come as dementors, I have toughened up…and here is the truth:
When you gender-shame me with improper pronouns and hate filled speech, you identify yourself as a hater, and make the whole thing easy for me. I can save my love and effort for those who are engaged and loving.
“But wait!!” I can hear the haters right now. “Wait! You have to love your enemies and be kind to those who persecute you!” Well hater…I will after you do. You stop showing up here spewing your crap, and show me how to love…and in my case, I am not even your enemy and have never done a thing to you, have never even met you! So you have the easy down hill…you simply be nice and love me…and then I will think about it.
“But what can I do to love you??” asks the hater…
Use the proper pronouns. We’ll start there.
Charissa
Transgender Children – Transgender Stories – Woman’s Day
Transgender Children – Transgender Stories – Woman’s Day.
Okay, I just bawled my way thru this story…Oh Mama, please bless this woman for her faithful love of her son and of you. Please honor her for praying that prayer “Change my heart”, instead of wreaking havoc by climbing up on the throne and trying to change everything and everyone else!
Love, Charissa
Are You Real?
“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit.
“Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful.
“When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.”
“Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,” he asked, “or bit by bit?”
“It doesn’t happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse.
“You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”
– The Velveteen Rabbit (or How Toys Become Real) by Margery Williams, 1922
Story of my life! :-)
“Getting no message is also a message.”
| — | stuff that took me a while to understand |
Going Beyond the Western Gender Binary
Hi Constance: This came across the transom today, and I found it fascinating! Clearly, the phenomenon of gender variations has been extant as long as gender. I am quite interested in reading of how this has been lived out socially in other times and places, cultures and spaced.
I hope you find it enlightening as well.
Charissa
Going beyond the Western gender binary – unlearning our backward cultural conditioning
In Western colonial society (which dominates many aspects of the globalized, capitalist world today) we operate under the presumption that there are only two genders, male and female. But gender is a social construction. One’s options for what gender they identify with are shaped by the culture they are born into. Biological factors are most-often the primary driving forces that choose among the available socially-constructed gender categories.
Cultures around the world have different ways of talking about, thinking about, and identifying gender. It’s often a challenge for (particularly cis-sexual) Westerns to think about other ways gender can be socially constructed. Westerns have the false equivalency of gender and sex drilled into their eternal psyche from the time they are very young, and re-enforced through examples in popular culture. There is no biological reality to gender. Many Westerners have the bizarre belief that one’s XY-sex-determination should also inform one’s gender identity, a socially constructed role in society.
In some cultures, there is no distinction made between gender and sexual orientation and the same can be said for sexual orientation – our culture socially-constructs the options and our biology helps us identify which socially-constructed option feels most ‘right’ and best resonates with us.
I’ve attached some photos to offer some examples of non-colonial, non-Western construction of gender. They’ve all been uploaded onto our Facebook page photostream in case you’d like to ‘like’ or ‘share’ them there. There are literally hundreds of ‘third-gender’ identifying peoples around the world. The eight I’ve chosen are mostly examples I remember from some of my anthropology courses but if you google ‘third genders’ you can find many lists and examples.
Who cares? Why it matters.
The most obvious reason to care about the way our culture has constructed gender and sexual orientation is to deepen one’s capacity for solidarity with people who identify as transgender, transsexual, and others whose gender or sexual identity exists outside of binary Western culture.
But there are other reasons as well. Western culture’s binary nature often creates non-sensical, problematic binary identity constructions that are inherently problematic. For example, I believe that Western masculinity (dominance, aggression, lack of communication, lack of emotional expression, etc) is inherently problematic. I believe that to be the reason why most acts of large-scale-violence and terror are committed by men (see: 100% of the mass school shootings in the United States), and I believe it fosters a degree of internal misery within people who heavily adopt these particular ‘masculine’ traits.
In the age of information, and the age of global connectivity, there is no longer any reason (particularly for young people) to feel isolated or restricted to Western definitions of gender, sexual orientation and identity in general. I think the social ramifications of a generation where more and more people begin to identify outside of the gender binary would be tremendous, and I think we should all consider how we can unlearn our cultural conditioning to embrace other, perhaps less exploitative and dominating identities.
Background information on the identities depicted in the above images:
Hijras
Hijras are male-body-born, feminine-gender-identifying people who live in South Asia (mostly in India & Nepal). Many Hijras live in well-defined, organized, all-Hijra communities, led by a guru.
Although many Hijras identify as Muslim, many practice a form of syncretism that draws on multiple religions; seeing themselves to be neither men nor women, Hijras practice rituals for both men and women.
Hijras belong to a special caste. They are usually devotees of the mother goddess Bahuchara Mata, Lord Shiva, or both.
Nandi female husbands
Among the Nandi in Western Kenya, one social identity option for women is to become a female husband, and thus a man in society’s eyes. Female husbands are expected to become men and take on all of the social and cultural responsibilities of a man, including finding a wife to marry and passing on property to the next generation through marriage. Female husbands may have lived their lives as women and may even be married to a man, but once she becomes a female-husband, she is expected to be a man. Women married to female-husbands may have sex with single men uninterested in commitment in order to become pregnant, but the female-husband (who is often an older woman, often a widow) will father the child of said pregnancy and treat the child like her own.
Two-spirited people
Two-Spirit is an umbrella term sometimes used for what was once commonly known as ‘berdaches’, Indigenous North Americans who fulfill one of many mixed gender roles found traditionally among many Native Americans and Canadian First Nations communities. The term usually indicates a person whose body simultaneously manifests both a masculine and a feminine spirit. Male and female two-spirits have been “documented in over 130 tribes, in every region of North America.”
Travesti
In South America (with a large presence in Brazil), a travesti is a person who was assigned male at birth who has a feminine gender identity and is primarily sexually attracted to masculine men. Therefore, sometimes the distinction between gender identity and sexual orientation is not made. Travestis have been described as a third gender, but not all see themselves this way. Travestis often will begin taking female hormones and injecting silicone to enlargen their backsides as boys and continue the process into womanhood.
The work of cultural Anthropologist Don Kulick (a gay male by Western definitions) in Brazil demonstrated that gender construction in Brazil is binary (like Western gender construction), but unlike Western gender construction, instead of having a male-female binary, there is a male-notmale binary.
In this particular construction of gender:
** Males include: men who have sex with women, men who have sex with Travestis but are never on the receiving end of anal sex, men who have sex with men but are never on the receiving end of anal sex.
** Not-males include: women, men who receive anal sex from ‘male’ gay men or from Travestis.
Fa’afafine
Fa’afafine are the gender liminal, or third-gendered people of Samoa. A recognized and integral part of traditional Samoan culture, fa’afafine, born biologically male, embody both male and female gender traits. Their gendered behavior typically ranges from extravagantly feminine to mundanely masculine
Waria
Waria is a traditional third general role found in modern Indonesia. Additionally, the Bugis culture of Sulawesi (one of the four larger Sunda Islands of Indonesia) has been described as having three sexes (male, female and intersex) as well as five genders with distinct social roles.
Six Genders of old Israel
In the old Kingdom of Israel (1020–931 BCE) there were six officially recognized genders:
Zachar: male
Nekeveh: female
Androgynos: both male and female
Tumtum: gender neutral/without definite gender
Aylonit: female-to-male transgender people
Saris: male-to-female transgender people (often inaccurately translated as “eunuch”)
Kathoey
Australian scholar of sexual politics in Thailand Peter Jackson’s work indicates that the term “kathoey” was used in pre-modern times to refer to intersexual people, and that the usage changed in the middle of the twentieth century to cover cross-dressing males, to create what is now a gender identity unique to Thailand. Thailand also has three identities related to female-bodied people: Tom, Dee, and heterosexual woman.
-Robert
EDIT: So let me clearly say that in no way am I intentionally encouraging white people (or anyone else) to appropriate these identities. Rather, I hope that this post and conversations like this will lead to an understanding of cultural diversity and other gender constructions/identities and an understanding that there is no biological reality to gender, and that gender manifests itself in many beautiful ways across many cultures.
I AM encouraging people in colonial society to have a less-binary, more nuanced approach to gender that doesn’t lead to so much domination and exploitation.
I also understand that in order to talk about these things, words like ‘male-bodied’ or male are inherently western concepts. Each of these societies and cultures have other ways of talking about these identities. Although I wasn’t born in the U.S. I have spent most of my life and the entirety of my adult life in the United States. I speak no languages other than English. There are concepts that I can’t understand, that my language limits me from even talking about, and in order to communicate these ideas, I am restricted by the only language I have available to talk about these concepts with. My perspective is etic. I do not belong to the above cultures, so when I talk about these things and use the English language to describe them, I am limited in my options for describing a concept as abstract as gender. The very categories of gender and sexuality belong to the cultural lens through which I view the world and I could not possibly provide a comprehensive emic analysis of the way the things we call ‘gender and sexuality’ actually are understood (if at all) within these cultures. In that way, mine is a very limited perspective. But it is geared toward other people living in Western society and it is aimed at changing this culture, not to appropriate these others but to not be so terrible toward gender and sexual variant people in this culture and to begin to question the implications of how we define gender and sexuality both personally, and as a whole culture.
Also, there’s some problematic stuff in the way I framed this and some of these only have one source.
-Robert
Hummingbird Hurricanes
all was hushed and quiet, so still
that the fiercely beaten air
fanned by that ruby throated
hummingbird became a hurricane.
her breath was fast and furious
in crimson jeweled puffs darting,
diving streaky panting gasps,
her wings whirring, fluttering frantic
roaring in the looming silence,
in my towering still moment
me so quiet here, so settled
and so solid that Nia-gara Herself would
whimper and under her breath
would mumble terse and choked,
reduced to churny tumble.
then a solitary cricket
just erupted into singing
and then nothing dared to stir
dared draw breath or dared to move…
and there,
in this space of cricket clamour,
in the hurricane of hummingbird winds
blowing but so far away
on lost lamenting shores
(in the edges, in the edges)
and an instant comes, arrives
when a wave is born and rises up
no longer sea but now itself
and knowing time and longing
to emerge and run forever
to the moon and to the shore…
this kinetic stillness stretches
in this intersecting moment
touching time and touching timeless
from the whirring wings aflutter
and the cricket in the gutter
and Niagara’s jealous mutter
to this wave leapt up from clutter
hanging on that crucifix there
not yet broken by its futile try
to fly across the endless sky
to kiss the moon and touch
her golden placid face…
the moment…the wave
hanging
no more sea from which it heaved
but not yet broken and unbalanced,
not yet shattered on the edges
not yet fractured there forever
to be that wave again…
…never…
that one moment of moon passion
and that rushing exaltation
(in the eye, in the song, in the mutter of this matter)
and then the moment shatters
and foretells a falling future
and the wave loses its option
has no way to retain wholeness
and just slide back unobtrusive
to the silver sea unbroken
there to merge again with nothing
and unknowing.
and the hummingbird is stricken
in the sound and in the breaking
of a moment and a wave
in a hurricane of movement
midst the singing of the cricket
and the mutter of that falls
and it darts away, is gone,
trailing airy sangre breaths
and the cricket falls asleep
and Niagara is emboldened
to again assert Her tumble
and the hurricane is gone,
yes the moment it has broken
and the Voice of God has spoken
in the quiet, in the mist.
but for me, well moments still
string together into prayer beads
slipping smoothly thru my fingers
as I mutter like Niagara
and I sing the cricket song
with my hurricane-heart flutter,
wings a-beating with such longing
for another rising moment
to arrive and to break over me
in knowing soft moon passion
and a promise of redemption
and release to finally rise
and fly away, my spirit panting
in red puffs and exaltation
when I reach the shore so broken
I can be no more there broken…
until then, well I will live,
midst the whirring,
in the singing
thru the muttering
in the breaking
on the shores
of Golden Morning.
8 Things Parents of Trans Kids Want You to Know | Brynn Tannehill
8 Things Parents of Trans Kids Want You to Know | Brynn Tannehill.
Posted without comment, on advice from my bff and my baby.
Constance, please read this…please hear hearts
Charissa
Powerful Quote…Charissa Perspective
“Do not fall in love with people like me. I will take you to museums, and parks, and monuments, and kiss you in every beautiful place, so that you can never go back to them without tasting me like blood in your mouth. I will destroy you in the most beautiful way possible. And when I leave you will finally understand, why storms are named after people.”
— Caitlyn Siehl
WOW! This quote gets to the heart of a very salient, perhaps the salient aspect of Love…it transforms us.
Period.
Once you are loved, you are never ever a “not-loved” person again. Oh, you can lose all your friends…acquaintances who were kind can turn on a dime and revile you as evil and lost (Charissa waves her hand and says holla! Been there…am there)…but then you will be one who was loved who is no longer…and thus still one who is/has been loved and thus never “not-loved” (or maybe to say “has never ever been loved”).
There are many things that masquerade as love: desire, lust, hate, fear, anxiety, courage, wanderlust, romance, religion, law…and many others, Each one of these things affects us, impacts us…but to transform us, now …that is a completely other thing.
I am speaking here of the transformation that is of this order: tadpoles into frogs, caterpillars into butterflies, ice into steam, plain water into tea or coffee, one who has never reproduced into one who is holding offspring, one who was totally spiritually dead who is not alive with a life not of this worldy order and frame, but with a Life that comes from Beyond the Universe…transformation.
So now re-read the quote, and you can see there that what she is saying to you is that if you show yourself to her, she is going to give you everything, no holds barred, nothing held back, come what may…and she is promising, no…she is covenanting with you that you as you are right now in yourself will be transformed…or “destroyed in the most beautiful way possible”…
I get that. I get what she is saying…and I want to be this kind of person, but with a slight but important twist that would read something like this:
“Count the cost
if you find me interesting
and want to know more.
If you really want to be in my life,
we will be together, and in that place,
everything looked at will never
be seen by one again!
We will see it, from now on!
Works of art well known
will seem strange and alien and
need explanation and interpretation.
Long familiar haunts of ancient peace
will be new and turbulent and full
of glorious upheaval as they
settle underneath the feet of we.
You will never again
taste anything as it once was…
it will taste always of peaches in hot sun
and fudge in cold snow,
of salt in rainy days
and honey in times of sorrow.
Every moment
I will be present with you
and the me I am
will be an always kiss
of your heart,
to your soul,
of your vital you.
I will never go away
until death sunders us,
and in that moment
you will hate death
as deeply as I do,
and vow to join my side
at the arena wall
when He stomps death dry
and disappears it forever.
Count the cost,
and if you still want,
then I love you
and let us go laughing.”
Love, Charissa Grace and all her sticky bleeding heart
So tragic…and yet so beautifully written
Terminology and the problem of unintended offense (Part One)
Constance, I think I will be okay to post about this, as it is unrelated to the other issues I am dealing with in my life.
I want to talk about terminology…and the way that an issue is presented, discussed, talked about and written about has such a profound effect on the overall zeitgeist of what the issue actually is.
Let me build on the article I posted yesterday (right here is the link again: Gender Confirmation Surgery: What’s In a Name? ), and tell you a bit about what it is like to be someone like me…or really, someone from any minority group that is little understood…but I only know about mine, right?
Imagine if you will that suddenly, for no reason that you could tell, everyone you met began calling you by the gender other than the one you identify as…if you are a woman, they called you a man, and if you are a man, they called you a woman. What would you do?
First, you would correct them…but wait, then you see the looks of confusion, or puzzlement, or irritation, cus no one likes being corrected for anything.
So then you will think, well, I just wasn’t careful enough…what is obvi to me is hidden to them, for whatever reason. So you decide to explain a bit…and the eyes glaze over, or they roll cus you sound so condescending and pedantic in your convoluted attempt to explain you are the gender you are.
Next, you will check yourself…your dress, your pants, your shoes, all the visual cues you can control, your voice and your walk and gestures…but nothing works. No matter what, you are still called the opposite gender.
No…really try to take a moment…don’t just read the next line. Please stop: imagine…there. Now you are getting a scintilla of the experience, minus the wonders of the gut-grind of dysphoria.
That is the first thing.
The next thing is say that it was permanent for you…and you needed to do something or die. You began transition, and you found others who are like you for support…and then lo and behold the culture begins changing a bit. You discover allies! Even friends!! YAAAAYYY!!!!
But you also find that there is a lot of simply uninformed thinking operative in those allies and friends. You feel like you already are getting so much forbearance from them that it seems nit-pickish to point out their well intentioned but inaccurate vocabulay…or the truly supportive but incredibly wounding comment…what do you do?
Correct them, to save them future embarrassment and feeling bad because the support they intended ended up wounding just like the bullies who misgender on purpose? Or overlook it, and continue to try to educate as a context for the relationships so they can soak it up and find themselves in the right spot organically.
I will be vulnerable and tell you all something: whether I am misgendered by a bully who does it on purpose to hurt me, or whether I am misgendered by a friend who literally has no idea, it hurts just as bad.
And it is a defeating hurt, a deflating one…punctures, drains, and then, nothing but empty and worthless…the shell seen and nothing inside.
I don’t know what is right, so I will just tell you what I am choosing here: I am going to try to gently, gracefully and lovingly correct. As I do that, I will ramble and say waaaayyy more than I likely need to…cus I would rather err on that side than the terse too brief and too open to question posting of “just the facts” Joe Friday style.
Part 2 will continue below. I hope the things I write here have some impact…honestly I often feel like it is shouting into a canyon and what I hear coming back is just the echo of my own voice in the lonely stillness. But that is nothing I can control…I write, so that is what I will do, regardless
Terminology and the problem of unintended offense (Part Two)
Hi! 🙂 Still with me? GOOD! Let’s move on now to a very sensitive and very important understanding you need to have if you are a trans-ally and/or friend: the misunderstanding that a transgender person is “changing genders” or “changing sexes”. You simply have to get this right, because the proper understanding of this is what will give you the heart connection with the plight of transgender people, and begin to expose the presupposition that biology is the locus and genesis of gender. If you need some information about why that is not so, it is readily available on line.
When you as an ally say to your other friend “I have this friend Charissa that I really love…she is changing sexes from male to female”, you think you are saying something affirming and supportive, right? And I get that. I do! You want to help explain what is occurring in my life, you want to show an identification with my quest, and you want to support me.
But here is the problem: from my standpoint I am not changing from male to female…because from the time I became aware in the world, I have never ever thought of myself as male! And that is the core of the horror itself!
When you as my friend tell someone “My friend Charissa was sooo brave today. He had the courage to be himself and paint his nails and wear his female clothes”, you think you are speaking of my courage and my grit…but you are actually wounding me very deeply by not really really grasping that your friend Charissa is not a he…and has never been a he…in spite of how I look.
I look the way I do because at puberty my body was flooded with testosterone…and if you are a natal female, the exact same thing would have happened to you! Think about that for a moment: imagine all your hopes and dreams as a young girl growing up, excited for the moment you began to blossom…and then instead you sprout, and sprout, and poke out, and other things worse…
Please…I am not trying to be a jerk! I am not trying to be that shrill on-guard defensive lashing out at everything anyone says sort of person. I am trying to let you know that if you really do care for your trans-friend or family member, your words will be life or death to them, regardless of the intent behind them.
I posted to the really good article on Gender Confirmation surgery in Part One…I want to say a little about my own feelings on this topic: it hurts me when people say to me I am changing sexes…even when they mean well. It hurts when I am afraid to correct them because it might hurt their feelings. It hurts me to not correct them because they will continue to speak the way they do in complete innocence but sadly rooted in total ignorance and will thus continue to wound not only me but any transperson they run across. And it hurts the worst when they finally figure it out, and they are then horrified and wounded that I never said anything.
That is my dilemma…I feel like every option is a bad one for me, except for maybe the possibility of writing about it here in one of my interminable mewling whining posts that drones on and on…
I am pressing on: it has been called “Sexual Reassignment Surgery”, and “Gender Reassignment Surgery”…but as you hopefully can see now, to me as a transgender woman that would be an inaccurate name, because I am not changing sex, or changing gender.
I have never identified as anything other than a woman.
So that was me…long winded and trying to be as gentle and kind as I possibly can, bleeding and feeling like it is an unwinnable battle…trying to educate on trans issues
Constance…I really am trying to help you…really, even though it seems like I am trying to school you or correct you, I am not. And frankly, right now I just want to run away and never come back and let the world just roll on.
But I have pressed thru too many times of discouragement to not know that tomorrow is another day, and joy will always find a way.
So in the meantime: your transfriend is who they say they are. They want to be loved by you if you say you love them, and they want to be talked to the way you would talk to anyone. If they are female, then they are not getting a sex change male to female…they are undergoing the medical treatments their body needs to live a fulfilled life (just as you would if you were natally female but you had a hormone disorder and didn’t make estrogen naturally, or you made too much testosterone)…
I am Charissa Grace…I am confused, discouraged, hard pressed…and I am determined to not go away and let the pain that has already been spent to all be wasted.
Sowing in tears, hoping to reap in joy, and seeing more clearly than ever that my name is my only hope
27 Signs of a Good Relationship
Constance, in general, I think that the stuff I am posting below is pretty good stuff…certainly my baby and me have experienced fruit in all of these ways and areas. And it is a good friendship guide as well, filtered for the obvi romance stuff.
So what about it? How are your relationships? Maybe this guide can help…and if you find a trouble spot, maybe you can isolate it and then dress it so it heals. Hey, when you get a sliver, just take the dang thing out, right??!!??? No need to cut off the finger!
27 Signs of a Good Relationship
We’ve all asked ourselves the same question at least once in our life: “Is this relationship going the way I want it to?” Finding someone unique, someone who stands head and shoulders above all those who came before can be an exciting prospect. It’s all too easy to cling to the hope that the special someone you’ve been seeing is actually the one you’ve been looking for, and sometimes it is necessary to think logically about what that person offers, and how both partners behave when in each other’s company. Here are 30 signs of a good relationship.
#1 You can be yourself
In daily life, we put up walls to block out the people around us, and it can be difficult to let our guard down once we find someone we genuinely want to spend time with. Often, relationship woes are the result of this internal struggle. Being yourself is one of the toughest things to do- not only in relationships but in everyday situations. We sabotage our own chances of relationship success when we shy away from being ourselves, and the mark of a great relationship is one in which both partners don’t even feel the need to alter anything about themselves.
#2 You are able to tell them everything
If a couple meets for the first time and they are comfortable enough, they often get a crazy, sudden urge to come clean and reveal all of their dirty little secrets. At some point, both partners will have to decide whether or not to succumb to this urge, and the choice they make can have a huge impact on the relationship. The type of impact it has can tell you a lot about the nature of the relationship. If both partners are able to open up to each other and reveal things about themselves that they wouldn’t dream of telling anyone else, it is an extremely positive sign. It means that they both genuinely want to be with each other no matter what. The mark of a great relationship is one in which both partners don’t even think twice about it, they “come clean” with each other, about anything and everything.
#3 Strong emotional connection
A strong emotional connection with someone is hard to describe in words, everyone experiences it in a different way and everyone thinks they understand it. It can elude many, slipping out of one’s grasp easily, and there are many things which masquerade as a truly strong emotional connection. But nothing comes close to the real thing and when you have it, you know deep down that it’s real. This is an essential part of every good relationship. If both partners aren’t fully committed to each other and don’t truly care about each other, then it is a waste of time for both parties involved.
#4 They’ve been through a lot together
Sometimes a person’s true qualities are revealed when they are faced with serious, perilous situations. Sooner or later, a couple will be faced with such a situation, and the way that situation impacts their relationship is a sign of how strong the connection is. Sometimes a couple already has a long history of hijinks together, even before the relationship began, as in couples who have known each other since early childhood. In any case, shared experiences between the two partners strengthen the relationship immensely, especially if they are success stories.
#5 They’ve rarely fought as in really fighting; their arguments are usually playful and helps build their relationship
Fighting is never a good sign, but sometimes it is necessary, and never is it a good idea to keep concerns bottled up without expressing them. Communication is key in any relationship. It is imperative, however, that the need to express oneself does not overstep the boundaries of communication into physical violence. People who truly care about each other do not inflict pain on one another. In some relationships, levels of passion run so high that people are driven to do wild, uncontrollable things. Sometimes this is unavoidable, although still completely inexcusable. As long as there is no violence or abuse whatsoever, a fight can actually build tighter bonds and prove to both partners that intensity is present in the relationship.
#6 They both can trust each other
Trust is a crucial part of any relationship. One could even go as far as to say it is the foundation of a good relationship. Without trust, both partners will be fighting an uphill battle until they resolve this part of the puzzle. Trusting someone means believing in someone, it means casting aside all doubts and diving headfirst into the unknown. This is one of the hardest things to do in any relationship, because it means risking everything. That is why only the strongest of relationships exhibit true trust, because both partners risk betrayal and heartbreak when they put their trust into someone, but they do it anyway out of complete faith in their partner.
#7 They sleep together
Sleeping together is an essential part of a healthy relationship, and has been proven to provide many health benefits. It has been shown that sleeping together reduces stress in the human body by reducing blood pressure. It also has been observed that people who sleep together get a better sleep and an improved immune system. It is a way for the two partners to reaffirm their interest in each other, reassuring themselves that there is still life in the relationship. If a couple is sleeping together, it signifies a strong emotional bond, trust, and true unbridled passion.
#8 They get each other
Communication is a key part of any relationship, but it is also necessary that the message itself is understood. There must be some level of empathy between two partners, and the mark of a great relationship is one in which couples can finish each other’s sentences and put themselves in each other’s shoes. Sometimes this can manifest in an eery, almost telepathic connection between two people, in other situations it can be more of an unspoken understanding. If at least a basic level of understanding is maintained between two partners in a relationship, unnecessary misunderstandings and worries can be avoided entirely. A mark of a great relationship is one in which a couple is crystal clear about each other’s feelings at any given time.
#9 They take care of each other
When a couple are in a loving relationship, they are completely devoted to one another, each hopelessly dependant on the other. In a way it weakens them both, and in a way it makes them both stronger. They cease to be two individuals and become one whole. They take care of each other because if one partner is suffering, the other feels it as if the pain were their own. Indeed, it is almost as if they both exist as a single body, and one does not allow harm to come to one’s own body. It is a mark of great endearment when both partners take it upon themselves to look out for each other and put their partner’s best interests first.
#10 They can rely on each other
A couple’s trust is truly tested when the need arises for one to come to the other’s aid in times of dire need. Actions speak louder than words. It is one thing to claim devotion to someone, and another thing altogether to actually follow through with it. Even the most unreliable, forgetful and inconsistent person will still pull themselves together for someone they truly care about. A mark of a great relationship is one where a couple has no doubts about putting their fate in each other’s hands, because both partners will always deal with their own needs and desires only after the one they care about is satisfied.
#11 They don’t really keep secrets
A great couple is always confident that they will have a strong connection no matter what. Fear of rejection and abandonment can sometimes lead to one partner keeping secrets from another. This fear is understandable, because one partner doesn’t want to lose the other, but in the end it will always be detrimental to the relationship. People who truly care about each other cannot stand to feel the guilt that arises after the deception of one another. When a couple keep absolutely no secrets from each other, it is a sign that they truly have faith in the strength of their relationship.
#15 They commit to each other
Unless two partners are truly committed to each other, their efforts to please each other will undoubtedly be half-hearted. To be considered a great relationship, a couple must be overjoyed by the feeling of causing each other comfort and pleasure. It must be a top priority. Commitment can also mean being unafraid to shoulder increased responsibilities and taking more serious steps forward in the relationship, like moving in together or having a child. Commitment is present in every great relationship, and it means that a couple is devoted to making each other happy and plans to continue doing so for a long-term period of time.
#16 They have pure love
Ghandi once said that the strongest example of love on this earth is the love between a brother and a sister. A brother and sister have pure love, they care about each other and it simply because they care about each other, there is no other factor involved. Pure love is not loving someone because they are pretty, rich, famous or visually appealing. It is the love of who a person is, plain and simple. It is the intrinsic value of a person’s soul which inspires true love. Great couples have a strong emotional connection with each other based on who they are, not what they are.
#17 They don’t really need others to validate their relationship meaning approval from friends/family
In the classic tale of Romeo and Juliet, two lovers from rival families fall in love and although their relationship is ultimately doomed, this is a great example of how two people who are truly passionate about each other will always find a way to be with each other, no matter what they risk and no matter who objects. A truly great couple will never put the wishes and opinions of their friends and family above their own and those of their partner. It a great sign when two people in a relationship overcome the opinions and objections of the people around them and persevere through faith in one another.
#18 They sacrifice for each other
A willingness to change things about one’s self, and to make concessions in order to please one’s partner is a sign that the relationship is a strong one. One should not feel the need to become a vastly different person in order to please one’s partner, or to spend lots of money on them, but in a great relationship both partners are willing to make sacrifices for each other. Sometimes this can end up improving both partners’ lives, especially if one is forced to give up a bad habit to please the other. A couple’s willingness to put their own needs after each other’s is a sign of a great relationship.
#19 They don’t focus on the past and when they do it’s more a matter of something they’ve accomplished
Couples who are truly content with each other’s company will always remain positive, no matter what has happened in the past. In a great relationship, two partners who are in good health will always be happy with the fact that they are together, and right then in that moment, that is all that matters. They count it as a miracle and a blessing that they have each other, and that feeling is so sweet that it makes them focus only on the here and now, the present. Often in great relationships couples are proud of the long road that it took to get them where they are, and count the path that lays behind them as further testament to the strength of their bond.
#20 They don’t expect each other to always be strong
A truly great couple can break down and cry together without fear of losing face. Neither partners tries to uphold a facade of being a superman or woman, they accept each other’s humanity and realize that life has its struggles, and that we all can feel low sometimes. A couple who truly care about each other doesn’t lose respect for one another when they see each other suffering, instead they try to understand it and help them through it. A mark of a great relationship is one where both partners have experienced firsthand each other’s weaknesses, and they have persevered with each other’s help.
#21 They ‘ve thought about as far as if their significant other is not around, they wouldn’t want to be around too.
Couple who are truly serious about each other often think about what kind of effect the loss of their partner could have on them. It is almost unthinkable for both partners in a great relationship to have to go through the pain of losing each other, it is not something that they even want to think about. This is because in a great relationship, both partners are such a huge part of each other’s lives that without each other’s presence their lives would be empty and meaningless. the acceptance of this sad truth is one of the things which makes a great relationship.
#22 They both appreciate each other’s flaws and bring out the best of them
It is often said that people are attracted by good qualities in other people which remind them of their own good qualities. On the other hand it is also said that people are repulsed by bad qualities that they observe in others which remind them of qualities they don’t like about themselves. In a truly great relationship, both partners are able to put these feelings aside, and instead focus on simply who that person is at their core, rather than what that person reminds them of. If in fact partners in a good relationship remind each other of their own flaws, this feeling is not met with reluctance but acceptance, and it can even inspire both parties to improve themselves and accept their own flaws.
#23 They don’t really try to make you jealous.
If someone feels the need to make their partner feel jealous, it is sometimes because they are not sure whether or not that person cares about them, and wants to see how much their partner will suffer after seeing them acting intimate or friendly with someone else. Other times, it is simply because they want to see their partner suffer and squirm. Either way, this behavior is not a hallmark of a good, functional relationship. A great couple is truly confident that they are desired by each other, and doesn’t feel the need to reaffirm this fact or prove it to anyone.
#24 They don’t take each other for granted; meaning each moment is something they appreciate.
One doesn’t simply get bored of a genuinely meaningful relationship. When two partners are truly captivated by each other, everything seems new and meaningful, nothing is routine. If the passion fades with time and a couple feels like they are just going through the motions, then the relationship is not a truly worthwhile one. In a great relationship, a couple may come to assume that they will always be together. Too often however, is the assumption made that this enables partners in the relationship to get away with all manner of wrongdoings and still be able to count on the one they care about to still devote themselves to the relationship. Truly great couples do not take the affection of their partners for granted, and will never abuse their partner’s trust.
#25 They feel like life is worth while
As long as two partners with a strong connection are in a relationship, life will always be worth living to both of them. If one feels dissatisfied or unhappy with their life and is currently in a relationship with someone, then the person they are in a relationship with isn’t someone they truly enjoy spending time with. A couple in a great relationship could be completely broke, going through the worst spell of bad luck imaginable and still love life, because in spite of all their difficulties they still have each other.
#26 They help each other stay grounded
Couples with a strong attraction to each other sometimes experience the strange phenomenon of being reminded of their true self when in each other’s company. It comes as a kind of heavy realization, that a couple only feels like they can truly be themselves when in each other’s company. Indeed, it can feel as though one’s whole life previous to meeting one’s partner was merely a false prelude to one’s true life. The mark of a truly great relationship is one where both partners feel at peace with themselves, each other, and the world around them when they are in each other’s company.
#27 They constantly empower each other
Couples that have a strong connection beleive in each other. Partners that are in great relationships never belittle or patronize each other, they take each other seriously. They might playfully tease each other or joke around, but it never becomes mean or distasteful. They are constantly encouraging each other to succeed and to try things which they might not believe they are capable of. A mark of a truly great relationship is one where each partner never looks down on the other. When people truly care about each other they compliment each other and constantly reassure one another of their potential
‘Gender Confirmation Surgery’: What’s in a Name? | Loren S. Schechter, M.D., F.A.C.S.
‘Gender Confirmation Surgery’: What’s in a Name? | Loren S. Schechter, M.D., F.A.C.S..
Hi Constance… I just referred to this in a comment over at Dani’s blog, which hopefully I handled in a graceful and kind way.
I thought you all might enjoy reading it as well.
Blessings,
Charissa
Related to THE Gift post…
“’Slut’ is attacking women for their right to say yes. ‘Friend Zone’ is attacking women for their right to say no.”
| — | And “bitch” is attacking women for their right to call you on it. |
Constance, recall how I have written of my axiomatic belief regarding sexuality…if you aren’t familiar with it you can scroll a bit and find it pretty easy. Well, in light of that I would obviously look at any sexual encounter other than a seriously contemplated and abstractly chosen one when not under the influence of feelings or hormones stirred up as a less than wise choice likely to result in brokenness and sorrow.
That is not to pass a moral judgement on that choice! It is, rather, a wisdom-oriented outlook assessment of a choice.
Having said that, I think it would be easily inferred that I would consider sexual behavior that exemplified in a true sense any of the words I am going to list as a less than optimal choice: Stud, Slut, Horn-dog, Whore, and any other similar slang. Okay, we clear on that? I am not affirming those choices as wise.
BUT: the quote I posted is powerful, because it confronts the way the current paradigm uses words, labels and the sexual choices of women as clubs to beat them with and bars to bind them with. And as such, I oppose using those means to abrogate the essential and legitimate right of women to choose their own destiny and fate with every last bit of right and permission from Them as any male has. Period!
And once that is settled, there is a true basis to dialogue together as human beings on how to empower everyone to make choices that best poise each one for wholeness and fulfillment.
Love yourself before you love everyone else…especially all ye who love to “speak the truth in love”…start with your own heart first, in all its towering deceitfulness before you start on anyone else’s…I think we each have enough to keep us busy without needing to start in on others whose hearts we cannot even see let alone truly know.
Love, Charissa
Pronoun Dos and Don’ts:
The T Word: Transgender
Constance…I have no words to express what this means to me…what is being said to me…both in the post and in the comments. I simply will repost this, and let you know something: each of you is a potential ally in someone’s life. I an so very blessed to have the one that I do, and she knows how I feel, who I am, and our welcoming, beckoning road…and thus for me to say anything more is inappropriate, in that the only legit words for to say are uh-MAZED and broken thank yous…55 years of loneliness is a long time.
You don’t get to decide the truth. Other people have their own experiences, just as valid. This is easy to forget. Your slice of life seems so large and unmistakable, like a mirage of wholeness from where you stand. But it is your job to know better and not confuse your small piece for the whole, even if you sometimes forget. Life is big—much bigger than just yours. This is the only note to self: other people are real. That’s all there is to learn.
— Frank Chimero – The Only Note To Self
At an event earlier this month, I sat reading over the only flyer available: an advertisement for The New Three Tenors. As I glanced over the neon page, I saw two sandled feet standing inches from where I sat. I found the feet peculiar, noting that the toes weren’t bare but layered with seamed stockings, and…
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So true…but the headwind, ohhh…the headwind
Saw this just now, and wow did I relate…the quote, I related to it in that I have some blessings in my life who assiduously refuse to allow me to beat myself up (if they see it! lol), and the pic…well that is just life right now.
“Stop beating yourself up. You are a work in progress –
which means you get there a little at a time, not all at once.”
Charissa's Grace Notes 
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