I'm Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack...!

To tell a woman everything she may not do is to tell her what she can do.
~Spanish Proverb


Where have I been, you ask? :-0

To save you from asking me questions, I am taking the liberty of imagining that you asking me about my absence for the last several months! ;-)

Where have you been? I began to think you quit blogging!

No way! I've been here on earth the whole time!


Well, four months is an awfully long time not to blog. So what were you doing? You weren't ill, were you?

No, I wasn't ill~had a couple minor medical problems that compelled me do to some extensive research, but laziness was probably the big issue that kept me from writing. And I got even more addicted to Facebook.


You've got all that free time. Must be nice.

Are you being sarcastic? If so, you can save your sarcasm for someone or something else (the toilet). I don't deserve it.


Why do you feel compelled to write such long, mothership posts, and letters?

Because I write like I think and talk. It's like gift-giving: I don't want to write anything I don't care to read ("I walked the dog this morning"), just as I endeavor not to give gifts that I wouldn't want to receive myself. Seems to me, writing is becoming ever less important to people~and short, grammatically incorrect sentences seen in Twitter and texting reign supreme now. I thank my lucky stars that I had a few excellent, strict, and unforgiving English teachers from jr. high through my second year in college. They helped set me straight. ;-)

And maybe, I just needed time to clear my head. Or do you call that writer's block? It's a bit of both, I think!


What have your typical days been like?

I wake up and practice yin yoga~often while listening to the radio broadcast of Democracy Now!, then eat my breakfast of oatmeal with ground flax, raw honey, vanilla yogurt, and half a sliced banana, while checking my email. If it is M, W, or F, I get my news blurbs from the Women's Media Center website to my email and scan through the news. Anything that looks interesting, I post it to one of many women's groups I belong to on Facebook (fb), be it politics, business, sports, arts and crafts, music, theatre and film, media and technology, etc. A dear friend I met on fb started those groups that I belong to and made me an "officer" of sorts (partner!), so I feel compelled to share these news stories on these groups. I get anywhere from 15-25 plus stories from the WMC, so it's a good amount to sift through. They used to email me daily, but last month, it became 3x a week.

I find it very liberating to share these stories and occasionally add my two cents' worth. :-)

Sometimes, especially this summer, my father in-law has been bringing in veggies galore each evening. So I wash, cut and freeze them. I'm talking gallon-and-a-pint buckets of tomatoes, banana peppers, squash, eggplants and other veggies. If it is spring or fall, then it's kale. Or strawberries. It takes time (hours) to process all that, so I like to put on an upbeat cd, and blast it while I do that work. I find it very peaceful. What I have yet to do (maybe) is pick all those veggies!

But I have no tolerance for being under the sun. A hot sun makes me hot-headed. You wouldn't want to be around me. I change personality very quickly.

If there's time and weather permits, I go out for a bike ride, either to the library (four miles, one way) or to fil's garden about 6 miles away (one way). The last month, I've gotten extra exercise because the state is rebuilding a little bridge next to my parents in-law's house and have thus closed off the road in front of us, causing everyone to use a long, windy, two to three mile detour. I want to keep my heart and body healthy...cycling is one (fun) way to do it. I hate exercising!

Well, I admit, if it is something I LIKE, then I DO feel better afterwards! Though the other day, when I really had to pedal hard to meet a shuttle bus (made it by 10 seconds to spare!), I realized how out of shape I was, and was limping after the bike ride home!%-0

Oh, lucky us: mil/fil have a small pool here! A dip or swim in the pool after a long ride is very soothing for the muscles...especially at night. Very peaceful.

When the weather is sucky or I need to get away from the computer (!), I read. I read voraciously.



What do you like to read?

Works by women authors from all over the world~because I was only exposed almost exclusively to the great classics by dead white men during my school years, some of whom have become my favorite authors. But if you looked at what I read during jr. and sr. high school and college, you might think there were only a few women in history who ever put their pen to paper! %-0 It's why Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre made such a deep impact on me in 10th grade; it's one of my lifetime favorite novels (read it 3x already). I'm just trying to catch up now and discover the work produced by the female half of humanity~and not necessarily dead ones!

Most especially, I love to read autobiographies and biographies of women of influence and power!:-) Women who were dedicated to improving the lot of women~and people in general, be it suffrage, healthcare, women's rights, business, public policy, education or what have you. I also like reading about women who broke ground in their fields of study, such as Margaret Mead, Marie Curie, and Rachel Carson. Those are the people I want to know about.

I pay particular attention to those who write well, like Simone de Beauvoir, Emma Goldman, Gloria Steinem, Alice Walker, and Ding Ling.


Why do you want to know about them?

Because I want to be like them. They inspire me to stand up for what I believe in. To advocate for what I believe in. To encourage others to think about what I believe in. ;-)


What DO you believe in?

I firmly believe that women are human beings and should be treated as such. And I mean EVERY woman and girl on earth. We are worthy of deserving every opportunity to reach our full potential, of having the right to a basic education~and higher education, if that is what we choose. We are worthy of having access to basic health care~regardless of our socio-economic background, without any governmental or religious body telling us what we can and cannot do with our bodies. We are deserving of the right to earn our own living, earning the same pay for the same work as our male counterparts, and KEEPING our own salary w/o being obliged to turn it over to another family member or spouse. We are worthy of having the courts mete justice out to those who have broken the law and harmed us, physically or mentally. And we deserve better public policy from our elected representatives to push for more family-friendly work laws that enable us to not have to sacrifice our own sick time to care for another family member when they become ill.

Women and girls are not commodities for the pleasure of the opposite sex. We are not slaves meant for prostitution or human trafficking for hard labor both here and abroad. We do not exist merely for the purpose of society to define us by our sexuality alone: either virgin or slut, pure or soiled. Or whether we open our mouths or not: good girl or bitch. We are human beings!

It seems all that I've mentioned ought to be obvious, but it isn't, to much of the world, including to some here in the United States of America. :-(

As long as sexual exploitation, sexual harrassment, violence against women, and sexism in general is occurring~and as long as I am alive and breathing, I will speak out (or write out) and advocate for the rights of women and girls to be demanded, enforced, and respected.

This is what I believe.


How did you come to be so impassioned about womanny things?

Life experience: observing women in my family, friends, coworkers--and even strangers, suffer needlessly throughout the years from cultural and societal restraints on their person. I.e., obedience to spouse (not reciprocal!), expected decorum, one-way respect (hierarchial), repression of verbal expression, enduring scorn for speaking their mind, suffering in silence for standing up for themselves, discouraged from pursuing their own interests and ambitions~which may conflict directly with the values of their family and community, etc.

What also has influenced me greatly is being an alumna of Mills College, an independent, liberal arts, women's undergraduate college in Oakland, CA. (which also offers graduate degrees to men). My time there awakened me to the issues women face, as well as keeping in touch friends there and quarterly newsletters in the years since graduation.



Do you think you will hold to these same views when you're an old lady?

Yes, of course! I hope that a great many things will improve for women and girls BEFORE I become an old lady and that I wouldn't have to even THINK about their present lot in life. But as long as we are discriminated against because of gender, and are exploited and harassed because of it, then I am ready and willing to stand with all the girls and women of the world who seek justice and respect until we get what we deserve, or until my last breath. Whichever comes first.



What do you plan to do with all this information~all this voracious reading you're consuming?

Foment a women's revolution.

Spread the gospel of social justice.

Keep signing petitions via various organizations on issues that matter to me.

Continue to hammer away at my congressional representatives on any issue that means something to me, via email or petition.


C'mon. Seriously.

Seriously! Why wouldn't I be serious about matters I care about? Yes. SERIOUSLY.



Okaaay.

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! You'd better watch out...! ;-D



Women are not inherently passive or peaceful. We're not inherently anything but human. ~Robin Morgan (1941-), American radical feminist activist, writer, poet, and editor of Sisterhood is Powerful and Ms. Magazine.