Billy Wrinkles

We love you, Billy!

Trip to Chi-Town

I just returned from my trip to Chi-town where I was able to hang with my dearest sis B and her children. Our sis L came from N.Y. to meet B for the first time. It was another great sibling connection for the tow of them and now L just has S, R, and J to meet and then she will have met the whole family. It was an awesome trip and as well as positively divine to get out of town. I even had a fun date on my last day in town. We visited the Chicago Art Institute and saw some intriguing installations of modern art and photography,
Two of my favorite kinds of art!



I always love spending time with B, we have a sweet and unique connection as I do with all my siblings in different ways, but it's so hard to leave her when are visits come to an end. She is such a strong woman, mamma, and an incredibly smart and efficient worker, student, writer, etc. I can't say enough great things about her. You Rock B! You're an inspiration to me and I love you.


L and I got a day together with the kids. It was fun but also challenging. Each one of those kids have such strong and unique personalities, none of which are passive, which makes for an interesting interaction. I love them all dearly.



L got one of her first opportunities to put her auntie skills to work and she did great! She directed the children and played with them too. She helped make dinner and after the children went to bed she stayed up and packed their lunches. Such a great auntie! I think L and I both got a small sense of what B does each day for her babies and it's no small feat, that's for certain.


Anyway, I have a soft spot in my heart for Chicago, even though I can't really imagine living there. It's so fun to visit and it carries plenty of good memories for me as well as being home to my dearly loved family. I can't wait to visit again soon.

My favorite quote-of-the-day, gleaned from face book...


"They have lots of illusions!"

Fiction

Below is a “fiction” piece that I am working on for my creative writing class. It is a work in progress and I am not sure where it’s going, what the character will experience next, etc. I am kind of at a stand still with its progression. I am trying to keep in mind that “only trouble is interesting,” at least as far as stories go. I am open to comments and/or suggestions.

Nothing Ordinary

Blue woke in the early morning hours. Her eyes lazily opened, not knowing for sure if she was ready to fully wake.
“I can’t believe I sleep with electronic devices,” Blue mused loudly to herself. “How pathetic! I have officially turned into a twenty-first-century single girl who falls asleep next to an open laptop.” She glanced over to the space next to her where a lover once slept, following a mass of jumbled cords laying there. One led to an IPod that charged off the laptop computer, the other led to her cell phone that doubled as her alarm clock. Its loud ring tone jarred her awake each morning.
She stretched out her arms toward the ceiling, yawned deeply, reluctantly pulled back her warm covers from the bed. She placed each foot onto the cold hardwood floor, right foot, left foot, then stood up and made her way slowly toward the kitchen. If she could quickly get to the coffee press, maybe the static in her head would subside, sort of float away in a scalding hot deluge of caffeine.
#

Blue came from a rip-torn childhood interpolated between a life she did not choose and the lives she had not lived yet. Even at a young age, she was acutely aware of this. When Blue was seven years old, her father built a wooden, make shift camper on the flat bed of his old ford truck. He installed a set of bunk beds and a wood stove, loaded up his family and hit the open road. Blue watched the world go by from the window of the big, red Ford truck her family called home. She remembered the scorching, blue sky reflecting down on her day after day with such intensity that it burned upon her soul a terrible feeling of loneliness, a loneliness so deep that every now and again she can still sense it lingering there like a monster underneath her childhood bed. Blue’s saving grace was her four sisters who became her best friends, her pseudo-children, and her loyal playmates. Most of all, they were her compass, for where ever they were she was too and as long as they were together, they were home.
Blue and her family must have drive a million miles, maybe more, with no particular destination. There was no such thing as one destination after all just an eternity of power lines and factories that poisoned the tumbleweed neighborhoods scattered along the endless roads of anywhere USA. The whole world seemed to be full of mostly all the wrong things, Blue decided, and she wanted to grow up and make it all brand new. At least she wanted to try.
#

Blue lived alone now for the first time in all of her 28 years of existence. It was quite an adjustment for her, especially since there was no one around to take care of anymore, no one to be responsible for; no partners, no children, no siblings. After all, her siblings were older now and they moved away, gotten married and started families of their own. Some had chosen to move to far away states, leaving the past as far behind as possible. But she had remained living in the same city her parents had finally settled the family in 15 years before, yet even they had moved elsewhere. Save for a handful of lasting friends, Blue was alone.

She wasn’t exactly sure why she was still in the small town, after all, it was largely unexciting and each passing year it felt as if it was closing in tighter and tighter on her. Yet, a part of her felt like the city had become her home somehow, even though in many ways the concept of “home” was foreign to her. But the little city had become as familiar as an old friend. She had walked each one of its streets a thousand times or more and she knew each one by name. Blue recognized many of the local faces and became accustomed to the gestured greetings of friendly nods and knowing smiles that replaced the need for words. She knew all the best places to hike and the most convenient places to shop. Blue took pride in knowing where all the mom-and-pop restaurants were that had the best food in town. She knew all the little hole-in -the-wall bars where one could, on particular nights of the week, find a variety of music, comedy, or open mic readings of poetry and prose. She had created a kind of community there in that small town, and it gave her a strange, unfamiliar sense of belonging.
On certain days she wanted nothing more than to leave, to go see the world or move to one of the states where her sisters lived. The possibilities were endless really. However, on other days she reveled in the familiar comfort of the small city and could never imagine leaving it for all the money in the world.
#

One morning the phone rang and abruptly woke Blue from her sleep. She grabbed the phone and pushed the snooze button thinking it was her alarm going off. But the phone continued to ring incessantly. Blue realized that someone was calling her so she picked her phone up and in a drowsy voice she slowly said, "hello."
The voice on the other line was muffled by a seemingly bad connection. She heard the faint sound of a woman’s voice coming through the static noise.
“Hello, is this Blue?” the woman asked.
“Yes, who is this?” Blue asked. “You don’t know me,” the woman replied sheepishly, “ and this may sound strange, but I was wondering if you could meet with me sometime today. I have something that I need to discuss with you in person.”
Blue thought about it for a minute. She wondered what the
woman could possibly have to tell her. She was confused, slightly worried, but also curious about who this woman was and what she wanted from her exactly. She figured that if she met her in a public place it would be safe to meet the mysterious woman.



“O.K.” Blue agreed. “Meet me at the Main Street Coffee Shop in one hour.” Blue paused for a minute and then asked,
“How will I know who you are? I don’t even know what you look like,” Blue said.
“Don’t worry about it,” the woman quickly replied. “I know what you look like, I’ll find you.”
Blue hung up the phone and stared at the ceiling for a few minutes. Her stomach wrenched with nervousness as she mulled over what just happened. She wondered anxiously about what the woman had to tell her. She got up and quickly dressed herself. She wanted to arrive at the coffee shop before the woman would, she figured it would give her some kind of advantage over the awkward situation where she had little control over what was about to happen. Blue brushed through her short, auburn hair, slipped on her shoes, then grabbed her coat and flew out the door. She walked the familiar streets of downtown, but they seemed different to her now. Maybe it was just the excitement of meeting a stranger on an otherwise ordinary day, or maybe it was the way the light illuminated the city. Blue wasn’t sure exactly how, but she knew something was different. She knew that whatever the woman was going to tell her, whatever she had to say would change Blue’s life forever.

my favorite songs of late...

Mine was a rip-torn childhood
interpolated between the echos of lifetimes past
and the lives I had not yet lived.

I watched the world go by for days
out of the window of the big, red Ford truck
we called home.

The scorching blue sky
reflected through the window
and burned a terrible feeling of emptiness so deep
inside me that I can still sense it
now and then groaning like a monster under the bed.

My four sisters became my best friends,
my pseudo-children, and my playmates.
Most of all, they were my compass, for where ever they were
I was too and together we were home.

We drove a million miles, maybe more,
with no particular destination.
There was no such thing as one destination after all
just an eternity of power lines and
factories that poisoned tumbleweed neighborhoods
scattered along the endless roads of anywhere USA.

The whole world seemed to be full of mostly all the wrong things
and I wanted to grow up and make it all bran new.

The media's role in the oppression of women.

I have been reading a tantalizing book assigned to me in my History of U.S. Media class called Mightier Than the Sword, by Rodger Streitmatter. There's a particular chapter that focuses on the attempts of U.S. media to inhibit the progress of women's rights. Some of the information in this chapter is so baffling that I am compelled to blog about it. So here are some quotes and snippets that I came across. Enjoy and try to keep them in mind on days where you might find yourself wondering how sexism is still so prevalent and embedded in some men and in society at large.

According to the book, a group mostly made up of women and a few men, gathered together in July of 1844 in upper New York to proclaim that "liberty wasn't the province of men alone but was - or should be- the birthright of women as well."
In a nut shell, women had begun to stand up and speak out to gain basic human rights that they had long been denied. Thus began the beginning (for the most part) of the woman suffrage era.

"Threatened by the possibility that women might be rising from their second - class citizenship to command a share of the male power base," Streitmatter wrote, "the men who dominated the institution of journalism either ignored the Women's Rights Movement or wrote about it in a tone of mockery and disdain."

Streitmatter wrote that the common belief of the time was that the distinct division of roles had to be faithfully adhered to for the well-being of the country, according to the American media of the late 1700's and 1800's, because women lacked the ability to succeed in the public worlds, as they were intellectually as well as physically inferior to men.

There were no publications by or about women until 1792 when the Ladies Magazine
finally came into print. Although it was about women, it was owned by a man and still upheld and printed sexist ideals like, "The number of women who have solid judgement is very small." Other magazines, according to Streitmatter, printed similar remarks such as, "The author of nature has placed the balance of power on the side of the male, by giving him not only a body more large and robust, but also a mind endowed with greater resolution, and a more extensive reach."

Steitmatter gives another eloquent example (not) of the Ladies Magazine notions about women, saying "they (the magazine) deemed it essential for a young woman not to consider herself first, but always to place her father's, brother's, or husband's happiness before her own, and that a girl should be taught that her peculiar province is to please, and that every deviation from it is opposing the design of nature."

One magazine published an actual checklist of common errors women committed including "not acknowledging a husband's superior judgment to women voicing their own opinions."

Through all the contempt by society and the media and their attempts to silence the growing uprising, women were able to make their first "dramatic assault on men's political and economic stranglehold" in the summer of 1848. A group of 300 people gathered for a two day meeting in Seneca Falls, New York. By the end of the meeting 68 women and 32 men had signed their name to a Declaration of Sentiments that read, "The history of mankind is a history of repeated injuries and usurpation's on the part of man toward woman, having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over her." According to Steitmatter, the twelve resolutions encouraged women to enter the professions and demanded that women be granted property and child custody rights, which they previously were not granted.

This is one of my favorite quotes which the group published in hopes of swaying the press to become more sympathetic to their cause; "In entering upon the great work before us, we anticipate no small amount of misconception, misrepresentation, and ridicule."
In my understanding such is the plight of any group or person who tries to create change in this world of male dominance.

Did you know that the abolition of slaves occurred before women's rights were upheld by law? Not that one should or should not have happened before the other, but it is an interesting fact.
Is it coincidence, fate, or circumstance that the U.S. would have a black, male president before they would ever vote a woman as Head of State? (l love you Obama, but the question remains nonetheless).

The progression and growing strength of the woman's movement fueled the anger of men and the press. The Philadelphia Ledger and Daily Transcript stated, "A woman is nobody. A wife is everything."

The New York Herald wrote, "How did woman first become subject to man, as she now is all over the world? By her nature, her sex, just as the negro is and always will be, to the end of time, inferior to the white race and, therefore, doomed to subjection; but she is happier than she would be in any other condition, because it is the law of her nature."

How hideous these words are, and how they have seemingly echoed their insidious hatred throughout time! No wonder we are a bigoted and sexist nation still today! It will take the courage, strength, and outright hard work to continue the struggle for freedom for everyone, even the gays.

Speaking of sex and the struggle for sexual freedom, Streitmatter pointed out in his book that in an effort to discredit prominent leaders of the movement, newspapers attacked the unmarried status of many of the woman activists. The papers characterized the single leaders, especially Susan B. Anthony, as sexual freaks. According to Streitmatter, the New York Sun wrote, "The quiet duties of daughter,wife or mother are not congenial to those hermaphrodite spirits who thirst to win the title of champion of one sex and victor over the other. These women are entirely devoid of personal attractions, They are generally thin maiden ladies, having found it utterly impossible to induce any young or old man into the matrimonial noose."

As a child I remember hearing similar rhetoric about lesbians and then, at some point, believing it. Maybe that has something to do with my inability to imaging or even consider having an all out relationship with a woman, even after I realized my attraction to them. Just a thought.