2009-09-11 20:24 | …

I've never quite sussed out the etiquette of having a "blog crush", but if it is meet to have one in this sort of situation, I would totally have one on Fugitivus.

(Wait, would I have one on the blog, or on the author?)

Anyways, the post: Personal Life Update

I can't even quote it, because it is all "aiee, yes, this!".  With the main exception of I'm not where she is yet.  I'm still a hermit.  But this gives me… not hope.  It gives me paths for how to get from where I am to where I could be, I suppose is the phrasing.

2009-07-13 00:15 | WHARRGARBL ahaha.

This is the kind of shit that terrifies the hell out of me, with regards to my ever having a child.  The thing that freaks me out is that I will make some mistake, and I will be taken to court over it, and potentially lose my child*, and there's no way of knowing what's a child-threatening mistake and what isn't.

Hm.  Allow me to amend that.  Clear example of child-threatening mistake: not locking the cabinet door, the one with all the toxic cleaning supplies.  Clear example of I have no effing clue: leaving my 10-year-old in the car whilst I duck into the store to grab a few things.  Or letting my kid ride their bike around the neighbourhood.  Or, god forbid, letting my 9-year-old ride the NY subway all alone.

It bites because I already have anxiety, and so I already don't want to let my child leave the house ever unless they're tethered to me.  I'm trying to read up on free-range child-rearing so I can figure out what society has decided is okay for children to do (operate tractors, yes; go to the mall**, no), and it feels like there's no winning.  Either I guard my child at all times and I'm accused of overprotection, or I try to let them learn how to do things on their own and I'm accused of neglect and abuse.  And I know there must be this really dirt-common middle path wherein one can do wacky things like hoshit put their child on a plane to [somewhere else] ALL ON THEIR LONESOME or let their child play in the backyard WITHOUT SUPERVISION *FSDJ%KLFE@ or things of that ilk without getting CPS called on them, but fucked if I know.

That's the fun of getting all your knowledge about the world from TV.  It's assumed that of course stranger danger, when really one should be worrying more about noncustodial relatives, for example.  Or "I couldn't let my child walk to school!", even though they're far more likely to be injured in a car accident.  Argh.

I will survive.  I just needed to go wharrgarbl for a second.

* NB: I do not currently have a child.

** The worst part is, I think the parent in that story did in fact fuck up.  And so people focus on "She made a mistake!", and leave out the part where she was brought up on charges for this.  Which is entirely leaving out the blatant classism ("You're rich and smart, you should know better!") and argh I just can't even get into it.

2008-01-13 02:05 | Naturally, I'm listening to that song right now.

First story.

When I was 21-or-22, my boyfriend-at-the-time, his wife, her boyfriend, and I went to a concert in the woods – World Concert, or something like that.  It had all manner of flavours of bands – Irish folk music, bluegrass, something with African drums, something with almost more instruments than band members, and so forth.  (I can't recall them all.  Though I can recall that it was in/near a forest, as I got splinters in my feet.)

One band was the Nigerian Brothers, and they did amazing things with drums and vocals.  I was there in a black top and some blue wrap as a skirt-like thing.  I wanted to dance, but I saw people towards the front of the crowd doing Real Dance Maneuvers, and I wasn't that good, so I didn't.  But then I noticed that a lot of people were just doing the two-step dance – not really a dance, more like "I'm moving back and forth, hurrah".

I want to note that I don't mock them for this.  Hell, I was doing that.  But I thought, "I'm not as good as the group up front, but I can maybe move better than these folk around me."  So, I closed my eyes and stomped along.  It was fantastic.  Later, I got a couple of people asking me where I learned to dance like that, in admiring tones.  "From the people at the front."

Second story.

I was at this club in Boston, years ago.  It's located on Lansdowne street, and it has a downstairs that's open and an upstairs that's more like a bar with a dance space, and that's all I remember about it.  The downstairs was playing house music, and the upstairs was playing rock music, mostly from the 80s.  I was, as you can imagine, upstairs.  And no one was dancing.  No one.

Then, the DJ played "Dancing With Myself" by Billy Idol.  "Well there's nothing to lose / And there's nothing to prove / I'll be dancing with myself"

So, I went up on the dance floor, by myself, and I danced.  By myself.  Oh man.  By the end of the song, a couple of other people had come up to dance – I assume they were emboldened by my willingness to, you know, dance with myself.

And now, the point.

I keep saying I want to write more here, but I keep not doing it.  Instead, I fill this blog with links to other people's words.  And part of it is because these words and links are amazing, but part of that is anxiety – what if I write something that annoys someone?  What if I write something and I'm wrong, or I get something wrong?  Aiee!

Well, if I annoy someone, then they have every opportunity to not read what I write.  And if I'm wrong about something, or if I'm ignorant about something, then that's an opportunity to learn.  It's possible that I will anger someone that I respect, but all I can do is be willing to learn if I'm wrong or ignorant, and be determined to be myself, whoever that is, regardless.

So.

Hello, world.