Archive for October 2007
In the crowd…
I can’t help it. I keep expecting to see you somewhere in the crowd. I could swear that at any moment you’ll surprise me, we’ll embrace and you’ll ask me what I have been up to for the last year. And you’ll tell me about your latest project, or get rich quick scheme, and all of it in one sentence. You’ll have this new trick to show me or a hot new girlfriend to introduce me to. You’ll tell me about how your truck is running and how Shelly’s doing in med school. “What’s the theme for Burning Man this year? Have you talked to Rose? Yeah, me neither.”
And of course, you’ll have a tale to tell much taller than the one you had last time. I’m never sure if they’re true. Like when you followed the dead across America for a year and smoked a joint with Jerry Garcia. How you lost your tuition money at one poker game in Vegas, but was happy because the drinks were free.
You never talked about the drugs. You never mentioned how the coke felt so right at the time, but cost you your daughter. You never told me the tale of cold nights spent alone with the whiskey that kept you company and filled the emptiness in your home, in the backyard, and in your soul for a moment. But you had it together when I met you with fistfuls of ginger beer and big league chew.
I kissed your shoulder once. You noticed and stared at me with a question on your mind that you never spoke aloud. It was meant to be an expression of warmth, but your skin held an electricity that I didn’t expect. But with it you had a coolness that shrugged it off as an accident. You really had your shit together, on the surface. I never would have guessed that your foundation rocky.
You’d still be around if you truly had the world in your grasp, as you’d projected. You wouldn’t have bought the whiskey. You wouldn’t have bought the drugs. You wouldn’t have been found 3 days later safely nestled in your own rot amongst the blankets after so long sober. Wasn’t it like 4 years or so? I’m sure you could have told me the days. You wouldn’t have crushed every friend you’d ever made. You wouldn’t have broken my heart with your absence.
With every death the light of life gets just a little dimmer. Now I know why humans don’t live for very long. A person can’t live in darkness alone. The shit of it is that I can’t put it down. I have certainly tried. If only I had known, had a clue, been less surprised. You had such a love for life, it never occurred to me that the junkie doth protest too much. But your toothy grin is definitely gone, all for the sake of one last hit. And when I shrug off this world like an accident I know that I will see you somewhere in the crowd.
People of the World! Listen up! Stop Breeding! Seriously!
The breeding fad has been around for too long, and it needs to stop. You people are doing this for the wrong reasons. You don’t have children due solely to the urge to love, take care of, and raise a child with dignity and respect. You are having children for the worst reasons imaginable, and none of you have the presence of mind to think about why you want this baby so badly. (I have found it is usually along the lines of “Gee, honey what would a child of ours look like? Let’s find out.”)
Accidental babies. “Oops, I’m pregnant. Abortion is murder. So, I’ll just keep it.” First of all abortion is NOT murder. Consider it a man-made tier of natural selection. It is healthy and necessary. Think of it as removing a tumor, only with a fetus you don’t have to undergo chemo therapy afterward. Yes, it is hard to do, but so is raising a child if you aren’t ready or prepared to do so. Speaking personally here… I am one of the accidental children and it was horrifying. My mother had me at the tender age of 16. On several occasions thru life, my mother would get very drunk, and sternly informed me that I was an accident, and that my life was the utter ruin of hers. She married my drunken father, due to her pregnancy and hasn’t forgiven me since. I know damn good and well that it isn’t my fault… now. But these things are traumatizing to hear at age 7 and 9 and 14 and 15. She’s a good woman, but she was never suited to be a parent. Women who are not prepared for pregnancy are not prepared for motherhood. Simple fact. Maternal instincts are a myth. If you are “suited” to motherhood then you are suited for it. But don’t hold your breath and hope for the love of poopie diapers and high pitched screaming to overtake you in a wave of ecstacy. It will never happen.
Worse yet, some kids are born to women who can’t find stability in any other relationship. If they are pregnant, they’ll often rationalize it with “at least a baby will love me forever.” That is an incredible and unfair weight to put upon the shoulders of a newborn baby. Shame on you! Get a hamster! A baby is completely controllable and has no opinions of its own… temporarily. What will you do when they get older, you have to learn enough social skills to keep up with them? When you want to live a life, wide in variety and freedom, what will you tell your child? Remember your parents? So, do you recall the unfair expectations that they laid upon you during your tender years? Or perhaps you fondly remember their exceptional neglect due to an interest in other things? They were put under the same pressures as you, learn from their mistakes.
Here’s a good one. “My mother wants me to have kids.” “My mother wants me to get married… to a man.” I was raised to have the utmost respect for mothers. Particularly those who are old enough to be my mother. However, your mother had her shot at breeding. She can’t tell you what to wear anymore (and if she can, seek help). She shouldn’t be telling you when to breed, nor that you even have to in the first place. That is your decision! Stand up for yourself. Be an adult. You don’t have to have children if you don’t want to.
Let me break things down for you: Babies are cute sometimes. This a defense mechanism provided by nature, nothing more. One baby is just like another. It is not a precious and individual snowflake. It’s a yowling larvae sack!
Giving birth is not a “miracle”. Pregnancy is a chemical reaction and should be treated as such. A + B = Fetus. It was perhaps referred to as a miracle back in the days when people did not realize that sex and pregnancy had anything to do with each other. Women just brought forth life in those days without obvious cause or warning. But now a days we are well aware of the cause and effects, yet the “miracle” is spreading like the plague. Producing offspring will not… I repeat… WILL NOT make your life “all better”. It won’t make your life “complete”. It won’t heal your marriage. It won’t stop your husband from screwing around. It won’t make you more attractive nor cure your menstrual issues. And that “passing down the family name crap” lost any meaning centuries ago, and it only ever had meaning to men (the selfish bastards)! It won’t provide you with someone who’ll care for you when you’re old. It won’t even provide you with a guaranteed Mother’s Day gift every year. These are lies and myths that you have been spoon fed from birth. The moment your mother had you she started training you for making babies! Children have been reduced to vanity projects. Happy to break it to ya, but you can get more love and fulfillment from pet store! Get a cat or a hobby! Volunteer at a Woman’s shelter. Help raise money for Cancer survivors without insurance. Take some pride in yourself instead of expecting a spit-gargling meat sack to fulfill all of your hopes and dreams with their mere existence.
Adoption. Now that is a time worthy endeavor. There are millions of children that have no one to care for them, with the exception of a government clerk that isn’t really required to “care”. I have asked people time and time again why they have given birth to children instead of adopting. I am often given half hearted excuses about there being couples out there that can’t have children and blah blah blah. This is utter bullshit. There aren’t enough non-breeding couples to house these helpless children. If there were, enough childless couples, foster care wouldn’t be such a nightmare. But it is.
Others who favor childbirth, do so because they feel that a child won’t mean anything to them unless it shares their bloodline. This line of thinking makes no sense to me. If this is such a problem, then perhaps you shouldn’t strive for children at all…just a suggestion.
My reasoning for advocating adoption is that if you adopt you have to really want it. You have to jump through hoops of fire and fill out paperwork and be completely committed to the pursuit of a child. Instead of, just realizing you’re pregnant one day and hoping that it turns out for the best. Therefore, using a baby as a vain attempt to permanently commemorate a beautiful loving and magical relationship that “mysteriously” breaks up once the child is born and reality officially sets in. No relationships are permanent. Only the effects are. I personally would rather tattoo my boyfriends name on my forehead then have a child with him. The former destroys fewer lives than the latter.
Bottom line. There is no reason to give birth. Pure and simple. If you want a baby so badly, you should pursue an avenue that has some dignity. Adopt a child, they are the ones that really need your love and care.
Abortion. Along with popular belief I am all for it! I saw a bumper sticker a few days ago (inspiring this little rant) and it said “How can you say there are too many children? That’s like saying there are too many flowers.” Honetly! I followed this woman until she parked and then asked her if she pulled dandelions and other weeds from her garden! What are dandelions? Unwanted flowers! So, morale of the rant boils down to; be an adult and don’t breed. Adopt a child or get a pet. Educate our young women on the “miracle” with a lot more facts and less biased toward breeding. Make birth control and condoms available for anyone who is physically able to use it! Make abortion legal in all 50 states and keep it that way until we actually have some reason to give birth again. Stop reducing our gender to the role of “baby factory” and have some self respect. Thank you!
If I were a stripper…
If I were a stripper, I would limit my song selection to that of Ani DiFranco and Joan Jett (maybe a little Voltaire on the nights that I am feeling goofy). If I am going to dance around like a half-naked fool on stage, I’ll do it to music that I like, Dammit!
If I were a stripper, I’d fart during lap-dances on purpose. Any man insistent upon getting close enough to smell my knickers deserves the full tour.
If I were a stripper, I’d use a pair of ancient, malicious-looking scissors to remove my clothing. And if anyone tried to touch me I’d stab them with those same scissors then promptly return to what I was doing.
If I were a stripper, I’d morph my hair into a rainbow colored Mohawk, because I think that style would really suite my personality. Plus, I am of the opinion that I could have boogers hanging out of my nose and I’d still be sexy. Therefore, my appearance is merely an identifying characteristic and has no real bearing on how appealing I am. (Any who disagree with this theory can have a round with my blowtorch, because I DIDN’T ASK YOU.) Moving on…
If I were a stripper, all over my body I would apply messages with glow in the dark body paint like…
“Sharpen Your Daughters.”
“My Body, My Rules”
“Unless”
“Fuck War”
“If you lived here, you’d be home now.”
“Don’t drop the soap for anyone, but me.”
…and other stuff. Maybe once in a while I’d use Mud or fake blood instead. (For dramatic effect.)
If I were a stripper, I would work out all of the time! I would lift weights, and take kickboxing classes! Not to lose weight though. I just want to be a bouncer part time. I’d love a job that gives me an excuse to kick some ass on a regular basis. That would make my fucking day!
And this is because I like being naked. And I don’t see a problem with getting paid to be naked, or even flirting. Elsewhere, I do it for free. But I would never actually be a stripper because of the middle-aged greasy fucks that I would have to strip for. Eww…or worse yet…The fucking frat boys. (Advice: Polo shirts look great on lesbians, but not so much on you guys.) Personally speaking, I think that all frat boys should have to wear a sign that says, “Beware of date rape.” There is no way I am taking my clothes off in front of a whole pack of ‘em. I am smarter than that!
Daddy Warbucks
My mother was very young when I was born. She was so young that returning from maternity leave meant looking for her first job. As a stout, though, graceful woman she easily acquired a position working with the elderly at a local nursing home. It was so local, in fact, that she could look out the back window of our apartment and see it quite clearly. It always seemed to loom at the top of the hill, eyeing us like a watchful parent. Mom quite quickly began to resent this closeness, but compromised by keeping those particular curtains closed a large portion of the time.
Working with the elderly is an emotionally and physically tiresome, thankless job, but it is a way for a woman to support herself. And my mother was glad to have the paycheck, therefore enthusiastic about her job.
A few days into the job, she was bee bopping down the halls recording blood pressures and temperatures. Just as she was leaving room 24 she noticed a nicely dressed man striding down the hallway. The fellow strolled up to her and asked for the whereabouts of his father. She recognized who the man is talking about, so she picks her jaw up off of the floor and escorts him to the room of Daddy Warbucks.
Now Daddy Warbucks got his nickname upon arriving at the nursing home several years before. At this point, my mother hadn’t heard his real name enough to be able to remember it. So, when we talk about it we just call him Daddy Warbucks. He was a man of considerable age, but always polite and pleasant with the staff. He quickly became a favorite resident for many of the women walking the halls, including my mother.
When they reached the room, my mother found quite a surprise. Now, she had not yet ever seen a dead body before, but she could tell from across the room that Daddy Warbucks was stone, cold dead. The man following her, however, seemed to have no inkling that things were off. He breezed past her and sat in the chair next to poor, dead Daddy Warbucks.
“How have you been, Papa? It’s so good to see you!” the man said with a bit of glee in his tone as if no one in the room were dead. Shocked down to her toes my mother goes to excuse herself, but the visitor called behind her. “Excuse me, Ma’am? Papa seems to be a bit cold, could you find him a sweater or something.” Without missing a beat, she hops over to the closet and grabs one of Daddy Warbuck’s favorite sweaters. Doing everything that she can to act natural, she squirms with the body’s stiff arms and joints to work the sweater into a suitable position, meanwhile talking to him.
“Gee, Daddy Warbucks, I bet you are really glad to see your son. How long has it been now?”
The son noticing his father’s silence pipes up “I know it’s been quite a while, perhaps even a year since I last came to visit. But you know how life can be.”
My mother trying to save the moment says, “Oh, but he seems so happy to see you!”
“Yeah.” The son seemed comforted with that somehow.
By the time my mother had securely fastened the sweater on this man, the son seemed to be content with the visit. He stood up, gave his father a hug, thanked my mother for her hospitality, and casually walked out the door as though he had done a good deed for all of humanity by spending 3 minutes with his father.
My mother, still a bit befuddled, ran to the nurse’s station hollering “Daddy Warbucks is dead…and I just put a sweater on him…”
Though the direct confrontation with death was a regular part of the job, my mother eventually got the hang of things and as of this day has never changed her chosen profession.
pain
Life does not equal pain, but requires it nonetheless. Pain changes people, the way water smoothes rock. Anger changes perspectives, and motivates people. Happiness is great in small doses, but happy people are less inclined to evolve. This lack of evolution can be connected to either complete contentment or the fear that if anything changes the happiness will lessen or end completely, giving way to pain.
Much like heat and cold, pain and happiness bear an exclusive connection. One could not possibly exist without the other. Without tears, how could you experience joy, or know it when you see it? Without the hurt of lost love, how could you take solace in the warm embrace of a friend? Without war, would we have a word for peace? Also, without a little happiness how could we see pain as anything other than the normal state of things, stagnant and unimpressive.
It is also my belief that in every painful event, there is a lesson. Even if the lesson is nothing more that reinforcement that pain is powerful, it is valid and necessary. Sit by yourself and look back on your lessons of life, how much in hurt, and what you learned from it. Take an in depth analysis of the pains that revisit you over and over again throughout your life thus far and find the common threads. Don’t encourage regret, that is just another roadblock waiting for you. Try to be impartial. The past is the past, picture it as a history book, and you are the author. Try it. I dare you. I dare you to be the valedictorian of your existance.
Hail Mother Spider
I have a spider in my bathroom, an English House spider to be exact. I sometimes imagine her breaking out the tea set with sugar and honey, inviting her friends to join her in polite conversation about the weather and the latest fashions. I never seem to make it to these parties. Very delicate and long legged is this type of spider, much like daddy-long-legs, but more streamlined, more graceful. The thought of killing her has occurred to me. Goddess knows she isn’t the only spider in the house, and certainly wouldn’t be the first spider to see the underside of my shoe. But for some reason, I just can’t do it. She built her web in relation to the wall and the bathtub, directly in front of the toilet. She built it such a way that during my morning bathroom rituals I don’t bother her and she doesn’t bother me, but she is in full view of everything. I wonder if she considers my bathroom to be her kingdom, and then my commonsense kicks in, of course she does. I suppose that I can’t just kill a female that is so brazen, such a rare breed. Besides, she eats flies. Bonus!
Last night I had a rare honor. I went to the restroom, and as I sat down to do my business I noticed that her web had two spiders. They were like mirror images of each other. They made slow gestures that seemed aggressive in their placement. As I noticed this I pondered whether or not spiders were territorial creatures. What I mean to say is, do spiders try to take over another’s hunting grounds? Was I watching a spider duel? I was intrigued. This went on for a minute or so, and suddenly the mirror image stretched out his fangs and then lurched his body forward. They connected and got sort of tangled. It looked like quite a struggle. Ihad expected one of them to stop moving, but when that didn’t happen an idea occurred to me…Spider Sex! Her majesty had a guest. I suddenly felt awkward for gawking at the entire arrangement without recognizing what it was. Am I jaded? I felt dirty. I felt so dirty, that I ran to the other room to grab my recorder. I already feel guilty, why not go to the next level. As I recorded the “last leg” of their entanglement, something occurred to me. How many spiders have watched me make mad passionate monkey lovings? I would imagine that there are quite a few considering my “passion” for the out-of-doors. With that in mind I felt justified in recording the exchange.
It must have been what spiders consider the missionary position. Do spiders have different positions? Is there a “spider style”? You know, your body doesn’t move all that much but you flail your arms and legs around wildly like you just won the fucking lottery. What about spider foreplay? Do they “play around” a bit first or do they just greet and go in dry? Can spiders speak to each other? If so, would they talk dirty?
And what should I do with the video? I’ve got it. It’s spider porn that I can sell to lonely spider singles all over the planet via (are you ready? This is a bad one. Brace yourself.) the world…wide…web.
Death… What will you do with my sex toys when I am gone?
One of my few certainties is that I will die. It is a fact. But how will it happen? I feel cheated by death already, because I know that I won’t get to see the last scene of the movie that I am such a part of. The packing up and moving on scene that wraps everything up and gives the viewer a sense of completion and closure. I want my money back! Or at least a hand in the writing process.
The idea of death has brought me to the thought of my funeral. Ugh! That could go badly! So badly. You cannot fathom the bad. First of all, the prep for the funeral. This is where my relatives go thru my house to “clean up” and fight over my meager possessions. And they inevitably find instead my staggering collection of dildos and other sex related paraphernalia. Whips and chains and candlewax, Oh MY! ***If any of my dear friends are reading this … take note. Should I kick the bucket. Break into my house and grab my sex toys. Distribute them amongst yourselves, first cum first served rules apply. Consider it a keepsake that could only come from the likes of me. *smirk.
But keep the naked pictures of me and post them on the bulletin board at the funeral when no one is looking. I would really enjoy that! Especially the ones of me spinning fire topless. I am quite proud of those. If you can’t find them, I am sure that Brandon still has copies.
Things I would like to see happen at my funeral…A bar fight…Should my family insist on a christian style funeral…I want the preacher to leave with a limp and a bloody lip, my friends and family exchanging blows and howling at the moon. “Where is the cooler? I need a beer and some ice before I go back in there to kick some more ass.” People are angry in general and never have the opportunity to express it! Let this be that opportunity. Take all the anger that you acquire on a daily basis, take that fuel, beat someone over the head with a hymnal and light a fucking match!
I want people to show up naked. I want my friends to get arrested at my funeral for indecent exposure and plead guilty proudly. Cover yourselves in mud and wrestle, winner gets all of my worldly possessions (with the exception of the sex toys. See above). And some tricky bastard should tumble the coffin. It’s just an empty, freshly embalmed shell with no further use anyway. Give the folks in the back row a laugh, for Goddess sake.
I want a drum circle at my grave, and some Irish bastard to holler drinking songs about booze and tits and blue ribbons, thru a keg. And bagpipes! I want some fucking bagpipes, played badly!
I want blunt honesty…I was a shithead so don’t paint your face with regret and talk about how much of an “angel” I was. The most flattery I could expect is for everyone at the “party” to share a moment when I made them laugh. That is something consistent about me. I have made everyone I know laugh at some point or another. Sometimes it is laughter thru frustration, but it still counts as laughter, right?
Maedan
Maenad
Maenad was a child once. No, really, she was. She wore children’s clothes and she played children’s games. In her mind she would create “happily ever after” and never before scenes. Her hair flowed wildly like the wind. And she never listened when a boy’s only reason was “’cause you’re a girl.” She never flinched when the teachers seemed to be no more intelligent than the school yard boys. She knew better than to take someone at their word, just because they say so. She was a smart child, she was.She raised herself, you know. She had no mother or father to instill in her the fear that they learned from their parents. After all, isn’t that the point of having children, to pass down your DNA along with your fears, superstitions, and prejudices? She raised herself to fear very little, to risk everything, and to go for broke every time. Besides, what is life, if not simply the opportunity for risk?
Maenad was born to deliver certain messages to this world. Messages that need to be heard, sometimes by a certain person at a certain time, and sometimes by the world. It all depends on the message at hand. She knew her message well. It was etched deeply in the very depths of her soul. And she spoke it to every woman she met, and to every man that she met as well. Each time the message was a little different then it had been before. Because each time the message could become bolder as she grew up. The older she became, the more significant the message became to her. The more she spread her message the more people could accept her message for what it was.
Though often her message fell on deaf ears, she spoke it anyway. Her smile never weakened and her persistence was ever strong. As she spoke to people a shine would come to her eyes, because whether or not anyone listened had no matter. What mattered was the speaking of the truth. Giving people the opportunity to listen was the point. There in lay the beauty of her existence. Her ideas didn’t have to be accepted. They only needed to be heard and the hearing would do the work.
And soon came a time when she was a young woman, on the verge of becoming something as great and powerful as the sun. She was the beginning of freedom itself.
Article I
I noticed him from the corner of my eye. The “Jesus” on his shirt nearly escaped my radar. Having caught my attention I read his shirt in its entirety and promptly wished I hadn’t. “Come to Jesus, or burn in Hell.” Oi! The words “burn” and “Hell” were written in big flame-red letters, and I could feel my face approaching that same rosy tint. But I grounded and centered myself, called on my Goddess and decided that he wouldn’t get a rise out of me. He, at first glance, seemed the respectable type. He was tall and lean with salt and pepper hair, a neatly trimmed beard, and a strong jaw line. If he hadn’t been wearing such a rudely worded T-shirt, I might have found him attractive.
I was sitting in the common area with a friend, Marti, and her daughter, Annie, listening to the folk singers and laughing. Annie was about 11 at this time and has had anger problems as far back as we could all remember. So, I knew that I’d need to be especially aware of her if I begin a discussion with this protestor. She’s definitely a chaotic soul, but she’s young and hasn’t yet found her pace in the world. Who knows, perhaps that feisty nature will be helpful in the life ahead of her? But it may also hurt her if she has no backup plan.
I turned to our protestor and asked in a calm yet very direct voice, “Why must you be so rude?” He shortened the distance between us, and knelt down so that we may speak face to face. This gave me hope for the possibility that he would be a gentleman during our discussion.
At the very get go he acknowledged that since I was speaking gently, that he would do so in return. I thanked him for his courtesy and we began the discussion. I repeated my initial question, “Why must you be so rude?” He proceeded to inform me that it was his moral obligation to save my soul.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t understand how disrespecting my traditions and my friends will save my soul.”
He said, “If you were drowning in a pool, and screaming for help, it would be my moral obligation to save you.”
“I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I am not screaming for help.”
“But it is still my moral obligation to save you from eternal torture and pain.”
“From what I know of Jesus, he probably wouldn’t approve of your methods. I don’t recall Jesus ever being depicted as relying only on scare tactics, but love and kindness.”
“You see, that’s were you are wrong, nearly everyone gets that wrong. If you read the texts, he was a man of discipline. He believed in swift and just punishment, as does God.”
“And how do you know this?”
“The Bible.”
“The bible was written by men”
“…men can do great things…”
“But that is rare. Men are fallible, and easily corrupted…”
“Men also have the power to do great things with Gods help.”
“It is more likely that they saw visions due to bad food or mental instability. They had mental problems back then, also. Mental deficiencies are not merely a recent occurrence. Today when someone says that God talks to them we give them medication or even lock them away. You believe in the Bible, but who wrote it and were they sane?”
He stammered at this a bit. He still didn’t believe me, but he questioned his righteousness for a moment.
“My biggest issue here is that, among us, it is incredibly rude to tell another person that their religious beliefs are wrong. No one here will try to convert you to their path.”
“Good.”
“But, I expect the same courtesy from you. And according to your bible, I have freewill to choose my own path.”
“You say that God gave you freewill, as he gave me the freewill to come save you from the pain of hell.”
“But if I were to come to your church, and protest your services, saying that your branch of Christianity was wrong and that you would suffer the fires of hell. I imagine that you’d be pretty upset.”
Pausing momentarily, he nodded in agreement.
About now Annie is really agitated and finding it hard not to speak. “Your shirt offends me. How’d you like it if I ripped it off?” I carefully grabbed the child and pulled her in tight next to me. I calmly whispered to her some words that I hoped would cause her to sit and think for a moment. “Honey, don’t wrestle with pigs. You get all muddy, and the pig likes it.” Quick as a snap she looks up at me and says very loudly, “The pig needs to die!” I looked at my opponent, expecting him to be appalled. Much to my disappointment, he was excited. He was flushed, breathy, and slightly euphoric in response to her outbursts. I suddenly realized his game. He enjoys it. The “love of the lord” was his disguise. He got physical excitement from other people’s frustration. He called out to Annie and tried to encourage her. “Yes, child, repent. Repent of your sins!”
I stated quite matter-of-factly, “She isn’t repenting; she’s is angry, and would probably like to hurt you.” I am still holding her, gently, but not allowing her to leave my arms. He looked into her face and realized that I was not exaggerating. He is now unnerved by the child and a bit more inclined to leave her alone. I whispered a few more words of encouragement to her and asked her politely to be quiet for now.
“Why would she want to hurt me?”
“There are many reasons. You’ve offended her. Also, she wants attention, and wants to feel important. Surely you felt similarly on your way here.”
Annie was offended by my comment, and struggled a bit more, but I promised to discuss it with her shortly.
Though showing that he didn’t agree with me, he abstained from verbal commentary.
I directed his attention back to topic at hand. “In this field of heathens, each of us has some kind of history with your bible. I guarantee that everyone in this field has seen a bible, and by freewill has chosen not to give it acknowledgment. We have had the opportunity to “follow Jesus” and we chose a different path. Your God gave us free will, why can’t you?”
Confused, he looks at me, “But you’ll burn for it.”
“Everyone here has thought of that, not excluding this small child, and chose our own path anyway. Does that mean nothing to you?”
“Then you’ll both spend an eternity screaming in the lake of fire.” The idea of me and this small child screaming in pain for all eternity caused a small smile to grace his otherwise hardened face.
“I suppose that you would have it no other way.”
At this he is flustered and eager to leave. I suppose that he got no satisfaction from me, as I hadn’t raised my voice or lost my cool. I have been as calm as a silk button throughout the discussion, and was in no way shocked or scared when he spoke of my “eternal damnation”. I suppose it didn’t occur to him that I’ve heard everything that he had prepared to say come from the mouths of my nearest and dearest loved ones. After that, there’s no protestor that can get a rise out of me. He rose from his kneeling position to signify his soon departure. “God loves you, and has a plan for you.” Before he left, I managed to steal the final words, “I am so humbly thankful that his plan… isn’t yours.”
He sort of sulked away. I didn’t expect that reaction, but I didn’t see him or his pamphlets for the rest of the day, nor since.
When dealing with an opposing protestor, always stay calm. Don’t give them the satisfaction of your temper, no matter the trespass. Most often they don’t oppose you as much as they want to see the “evil” in your eyes, which they so desperately want to believe, is in your soul. Some may argue, but it is my personal opinion that Christian protestors can’t simply believe in their own faith. They need to actively seek the “salvation” of others in order to feel whole. They’ve read only the parts of the Bible that they like and have thrown out the remainder, which is quite often a lot. Even so, I wouldn’t quibble about biblical texts with a protestor, that method is sure to drag an argument on to the point of exhaustion.
As with your temper, try to keep sarcasm out of the discussion as well. This can only muddy communication. Keep things at the level of polite conversation. If you can keep everyone from throwing things long enough, and if communication is kept clear, perhaps progress can be made and our cultures can find a way to co-exist.
Dear Mr. Employer
Dear Mr. Employer,
It is my belief that after the amount of time I have spent with this company, I deserve a substantial increase in benefits. I have committed at least 40 hours per week of my ever shortening life to making money for you instead of writing my novel. I have brought you coffee every morning (only occasionally spitting in it or using rotten milk as creamer), even though I am certain that your own damn legs work just fine for the process of getting it yourself. I have catered to your ego by not correcting you when you think you are “hot shit”. Even though, frankly speaking, years of business meetings and reports that have forced you to sit at your desk and do nothing have molded you into the sexual equivalent of a corpse.
I have never set the building on fire, or committed bodily harm to any other employees, regardless of many tantalizing opportunities. I have never stolen from the company anything of substantial importance or value. I have never been rude to a customer that wasn’t rude to me first. I have been a model employee.
My commitment to this company must be readily apparent to you, especially considering that I haven’t been working to save the world during business hours. If I weren’t here at my desk every damn day, I could be rescuing our nation away from the spindly fingers of our republican super villains. I could go to pro-choice rallies; I could march for women’s rights. I could have been working for gay rights, and for racial acceptance for all. I could be lovingly spoon feeding the starving people of our country. I could provide advice for young unintended mothers. I could be chipping at the walls of poverty with a jack hammer. I could pierce my nose and die my hair a sharp green color. I could be free. So you must see how dedicated I am to the job, or at least to the steady paycheck, otherwise I would be out in the world living my life, and creating change where I feel it is needed.
So, here is my proposal Mr. DeMan. I want your full and total commitment to the evolution of our country.
- Since I have ascertained that your actual presence in this office is entirely expendable, for every “long weekend” that I spend making you money, you are going to spend a “long weekend” marching on Washington and petitioning for Gay and Women’s rights.
- For every dime you pay me, you will devote an equal amount to finding a cure for AIDS. And every dime that I make for you and the money grubbing bastards on the board, you will donate half of that to the NOW organization.
- I want to see you marching in the Gay Pride Parade, holding a sign that says “I kiss boys”. Whether or not you are gay is of no importance, but your show of support is.
- In order to park in the company lot your car must bear a clearly visible sticker that reads “I’m a feminist, and I vote.”
- And I get to dye my hair any color I please. Simply because our appearance should only be an identifying characteristic and not gage for status.
If you have any disagreement in regards to the opinions or comments stated in the above text, my office is the fourth one down the hall on the left, and I will have my blowtorch close at hand. Thank you for your time and consideration.
Sincerely,
The Feminist Drone
That answers the phone
And prays for your evolution.
P.S. You’re wife is hot!
