What a difference a day makes. 24 hours ago, I was sitting there sullenly at my desk, kind of loathing my existence. Today, I’ve got a paid day off, and tomorrow I return to the only job I’ve ever known that made me feel like I was part of a family.
It has been 12-13 years since I had a job with an asshole employer. This was the first time since that I’d had an employer that I felt was, well, unfair. I’m not going into specifics. It is what it is, and I have too developed a readership to go slagging anyone.
But let’s face it, not everyone knows how to manage. There are people who have such great personalities that they get overlooked for how they sometimes treat others, and they can be hell to work for.
I’m a big believer in learning from life as it happens. You can just dismiss things and say “shit happens,” or you can ask “why does shit happen?” Everything I ever needed to know I learned from Philosophy 101. Why?
For me it makes life so much better when I assign value to all the things that go down in my life. For every failure, I try to learn something. And whether I want to accept it or not, I was fired. I failed in some capacity, and while I consider myself fortunate to have been uninvited from that particular party, there’s a part of me that knows what rejection feels like again.
Do you ever sit back in your comfy arm chair, watching some talk show, on which is some woman telling of all the abuse she endured through her many years of marriage, and sit there, thinking, “Jesus, honey! Why didn’t you leave?! At what point do you finally clue the fuck in and say, ‘Gee, I think this might be a bad situation?’ Fuck!”
Yet how many of us work every day in jobs we hate? Jobs where you know it’s just a paycheque, baby? How many of us tolerate rude, belligerent employers who don’t know how to sit the fuck down and trust us to do the jobs we’re supposed to be hired to do? It’s psychological abuse, really, when you work in a situation like that. But because they sign our paycheques and keep the roofs above our heads, we somehow feel like they’ve got permission to treat us like they do.
And I don’t give a fuck what kind of job it is, what kind of pressure it is, it’s not too goddamned much to ask that employees everywhere get treated in a reasonably professional manner. I’m not so sure that’s how I was treated of late. Two people there were good, though. Pity about the unbalance.
So, uninvited from the party, I have to tell you that today’s the first time since about… February of this year that I’ve woken up without this palpable fear of whether all the bills are going to be paid and whether I’m gonna have my integrity intact at the end of the day. In the spring I was just financially insecure. Of late, I was underpaid and treated somewhat questionably. Different scenarios, but similar results.
I feel like a fucking mammoth weight has come off my shoulders, is what I’m trying to say. And I’m also trying to suggest that, if you’re one of those people working a job you hate, you really need to start asking yourself if the cost benefit ratio of going through THAT every single day is worth it. I mean, shit. I feel like I’ve just broken the water’s surface and am finally breathing again. I had no idea those many months were taking the toll they’ve now so obviously been taking.
I always said I was lucky to never have really had to work in a bad situation. Now I have. I’m one of those freaks that likes having difficult experiences because then I always grow. It’s my choice to gain from the situation, ain’t it? So I’m having a good day. Friday’s coming and so’s that 33rd birthday. Older? Wiser? Fucking right I am.
I wouldn’t have had the guts to quit without another job to go to. Getting fired was the only way that situation was gonna get resolved, unless one of the headhunter positions worked out. So my perfect record gets smeared. Whatever. I’m glad I’m moving on to potentially better times.
It’s one of those times where you, the reader, gets to sit back and ponder your own life’s satisfaction. Is it really going the way you want? Is it worth it to keep compromising? Think about it. Then remember one of my favourite sayings: Life’s too fucking short.
Hallelujah. I got fired. Uninvited. Ha. And look, it’s sunny out. Go fuckin’ figger.
Category Archives: Best of Steff
Good news! I got fired!
Heh. Yep, you read right. I’m happy I just got fired.
I hated the job, or more accurately, one of the bosses. Worse yet: It sucked the will to write right out of me.
Putting words on a screen’s pretty fucking easy most days and I can do it in my sleep, but the GOOD writing, well, that comes from places that machines can’t mine. When the mix is off, it’s really, really difficult to get things gelling again. And, honestly, something about that job just killed my creativity.
And, being such an affable and good chick as I am, the folks I worked the last six years for are taking me back without even thinking twice. Not permanently, but “for a while” at the very least, and “for a while” is what I need.
And the moral of this story, boys and girls, is that when adversity happens, don’t think about the fucking adversity. Think about overcoming it. Within 10 minutes I went from losing a job to getting another one, in essence, and that comes from acting, not fretting.
I’m a happy camper. I lost a job I hated. I’m going back to one that had me, for some weird reason, writing better than I’ve ever written before. Methinks I’ve come out ahead.
But the good news for you is, soon I’ll be back to writing well. Don’t think I don’t know this blog’s been off-kilter for some time. I know it all too well. I already have a couple fun things planned for postings.
I’d kill to hear “Ding, dong, the witch is dead” right now, ‘cos it sums up how I’m feeling pretty nicely.
On Freedom and Fallacies
This is take two on this topic. I’m starting fresh a couple hours later, after a glass of wine and homemade chicken pot pie.
It’s the second take because this topic is really important to me and I don’t want to fuck it up.
Thank god I have quality guidance like that of Fame. Yes, you heard me, the ‘80s arts school drama. It’s on, and I’m chilling. Defragging my mind, as I like to say. Watching fluff is exactly the right fit, and has given me some interesting perspective as I crack this nut for a second time.
Funnily, a girl in this episode of Fame scoffs at the notion of writing her private thoughts and dreams in a diary at the teacher’s urging.
“If I wrote down my dreams,” she says, “I’d get arrested.”
Yeah. Huh. Ironic.
To that end, take note of the week that was in the world of the wide web. Proper fucked, indeed. It’s like a crash course in What Not to Do in the Intertubez.
A Montreal guy writes some shit in a forum then figures rifle + college = a good afternoon’s plan.
Like the motherfucking coward he was, he went out and tried to kill a bunch of people. Realizing he couldn’t even do a massacre right, he deprived us of the fun of letting cops kill him. The coward took his life. Fucking better off dead, anyhow.
But he wrote in forums.
We shoulda seen it coming.
A dickhead in Seattle decides he’s going to act like a fucking 13-year-old and reposts another city’s craigslist ad by some dirty-minded femme, and gets a couple hundred responses or something, then figgers he’s got rights to publish that private correspondence in an attempt to expose those apparent sickos to the world.
But they answered a public ad.
They shoulda seen it coming.
A young mother in Florida writes her secret other self dark thoughts on a public blog, and then her child goes mysteriously missing, improbably snatched from their window. Young mother kills herself 16 days into the toddler’s absence.
But she wrote dark shit on blogs, then her kid vanishes.
We shoulda seen it coming.
A video diarist on the world wide web is exposed as a professional actress working off a script. The show is produced, directed, and written, yet has duped the majority of its viewers, primarily through YouTube.com, into believing the so-called lonelygirl15 was a teenaged girl locked in her bedroom and homeschooled by orthodox religious parents. Doh.
She’s a fake.
“Like ohmigod. But she, like, really talked to us, man!”
You shoulda seen it coming.
It’s happening. It’s really fucking happening.
You know what I’m talking about.
For some godforsaken reason, it’s starting to occur to people that this, like, internet thing might just be a way of seeing what’s really going on in the noggins of little people everywhere.
And, um, uh-oh, but what’s going on in those little people’s noggins everywhere is something that’s not very pretty.
Some people, it would seem, are angry.
Some of them even feel disenfranchised. And, look. They’re acting on this shit.
Yeah, well. When the odds are stacked, you ought not be surprised at the outcome. Probability and logic being what they are and all, yes?
I’m part of the generation that got schooled in Orwell’s classic 1984. We were raised to believe that someday, one day, the government would hear every word we would utter, and freedom would be a thing of the past.
I’ll be honest, the Digital Age scares me.
The ease with which people can access information about me is frightening. It should frighten you, too. Unfortunately, the time is coming nigh where voices on the web are not just an anonymous blur with little impact on the real world. Now, we’re not so anonymous, and now this world is more real than it is virtual.
There’s coming a time where what you say here is going to come home to haunt you. This is the age of insinuation, and anything you say can be manipulated and used against you. Decide now if you plan to live in fear of that, or if you have the balls to play the game my way, and own your ability to say what you think and how you feel.
In forums such as this, someone such as me might decide to write a little bloggie in which the entire contents of our deepest darkest other selves are posted up on virtual walls for the world at large to indulge in.
In essence, it’s a voice. I have a voice, you have a voice, we all have voices.
It’s idyllic. A virtual Utopia in which we’re all given voices and identities, something that ironically clashes with our seemingly democratic lives – lives spent living in societies that claim to be governed by the people, of the people, for the people.
Only they’re not like any people I’ve ever known.
And I don’t feel like I belong.
And I’m tired of feeling this small because I’m just an ordinary gal.
I thought I’d take my voice and use it. I’m not alone. You’re doing it too. And him, and her, and hey.
We all took our existences online, where we thought we’d have the right to say what we think whenever the fuck it pops into mind.
Unfortunately, when such vocal freedom is enjoyed by a world at large, some of those voices will be beyond dissent. They will be voices of rage and fury and vengeance. Or maybe they’ll be coolly quiet.
And that’s a risk we take by allowing open dialogue.
Every now and then, though, those voices will be warning signals. Intervention might occur, and it might segue to prevention.
Just because assholes and the disenfranchised like these can use the web to serve their fucted means doesn’t necessitate that the rest of us should have to watch our words.
Sadly, the voice of reason doesn’t seem to resonate these days. I fear that the talking heads of today might soon decide that there is such thing as too much free speech and they will indeed succeed in legislating the internet.
In which case now might be the time to, like the good hunter Elmer Fudd suggests, be vewwy, vewwy qwiet.
Only we’re not hunting rabbits.
What Wicked Web We're Weaving
It’s been a rough week or two in the CyberGalaxy. At one end of the connectivity cosmos, a fraud in the Emerald City, Jason Fortuny, who duped the Craigslist sex-starved masses into sending to him graphic and revealing personal emails that were then splayed accross the world wide web for mockery and exposing.
Then, at the seeming other end of the sticky web, Lonelygirl15, who similarly duped the masses, but this time into believing a series of well-developed and elaborate hoaxes revolving around her as the poor disenfranchised trapped little daughter of overly religious parents.
And tonight we’ve heard the news that an avid blogger mother has apparently committed suicide while her child has been snatched from his crib. Missing, dead, who knows. Her blog reveals disturbing and dark imagery in her writing.
All in all, it’s been a rough few days for the blogworld. There are repercussions out there in the real world for what we do in this one. It sometimes seems a rude awakening to some bloggers, but it is what it is. I’ve had my last employer sending me emails about postings I’ve been doing. We discussed my perception of their firm. It’s been interesting getting that delayed reaction.
I plan to tackle these above topics in a single post over the next few days, but just to lay the groundwork, there’s the outline up there. If you have any opinions about the strangeness of these three varied examples of cybersecrets go boom, please do share.
UPDATE:
THE MOTHER WHO HAS COMMITTED SUICIDE as a result of a grilling by Nancy Grace on her scandalous Headline News show, after her toddler being snatched (but some suspect she had a hand in it, given the nature of her blogging) is 21-year-old Melinda Duckett.
Should Irwin Have Changed After Kids?
So, earlier I asked if you have the right to ask a risk-taker to tone down their lifestyle once you get hooked to them.
My opinion? No. You do not. And if they tell you you can go ahead and tell them how to change; don’t. You’d fucking with what oughtn’t be fucked.
In a nutshell.
My posting was inspired by the death of Steve Irwin. There are those who apprently think he should’ve “settled down” since he had kids. Yeah, as a kid, the first thing I wanna know is that my father gave up almost everything he loved so he could raise me — sit in a fucking armchair with a remote and tell me how he “used to be like that” once.
Terri Irwin got a precious gift that most of us might never, ever, ever receive: She fell in love with someone who kept all the qualities that made him so loveable as the person he was when they first met. Bloody sweet, that. And she had it for a while. And then it got snatched. Love happens, death happens, it all is what it is.
Life’s a truckload of hurts some days and there’s no getting around that.
The point is, it’s hard enough to be ourselves in the face of everyday life. It’s harder still to remember who we are when we get lost in the arms of someone else. To be able to hang on to your identity despite your love for someone else and your wish to be with them, why, that’s as downright admirable as it gets.
To hell with those who think otherwise.
_________________
In other Croc-Hunter news, let me go on record to say that, while Germaine Greer periodically says something intelligent, I:
a) think she can be a complete twat who has done as much to hinder feminism as she has to further it. She’s arrogant, dismissive of men, flighty, inconsistent, hypocritical, and far too militant for my tastes. (Despite my believing I’m a feminist, thank you very much. Ain’t no fucking eunuch here, baby.)
b) think she’s a far bigger bitch than I’d thought before now that I’ve read her comments on the death of Steve Irwin.
I do not believe that to be a strong woman I need to demoralize men. I believe that, as a strong, independent chick, I can exalt men in my life and cater to them as I wish, because I fucking well know who I am when I go to bed at night (most of the time; we all get a little too lost in our relationships some of the time). I take no backseat to any man. But I’ll hold the door open for ’em if they’ll let me, because I have nothing to prove. I’m empowered by the mere fact that I don’t need to seek power, all right?
I’d get into my whole beef about how feminism has been executed, but I’m too tired and it’d take too damned long. Suffice to say that while I fight for my equality, I don’t think it needs to come at the cost of emasculating men. There’s room enough for us both, and I don’t think chicks like Greer understand that concept, but then I don’t like her enough to read her work. I listen to others gripe about her and praise her, so I’m ignorant, but by choice.
Where are the manners?
Every now and then an email comes in that’s the exact right email for what’s going on in my life. That happened Friday. I’d had an incident earlier in the day that had me seething with rage, and his email hit right home. So, first, the email, then I’ll tell you what happened, and then you’ll get my two cents. Sounds like a plan, no?
I was wondering if there was a certain age where teenagers or adults realise that manners are important and can learn to appreciate them? Because I’ve been trying my whole life (I’m still a teenager, but still) to be a gentleman (opening doors for others, asking if the elderly need help, speaking politely, etc.) and to be helpful as much as possible, but it seems that it is not appreciated at all. So far throughout a few years of high school, I’ve tried to help others boost their marks with assistance on their homework, but they can’t seem to understand that others have morals and won’t cheat for them. (again, turning into a rant i suppose..)
I guess I’m really just sending this email to ask another’s opinion about manners and whether or not it is truly appreciated in today’s society. I’ve asked a few teenage girl friends and they say that it is good to have manners and it’s something important they look for, yet I see them going out with lowlife guys who are despicable and need to learn manners. Is this just a teenage thing to do that you overcome later on and realise it’s importance and learn to be grateful for it? Or is it completely dependant on the people’s standards they’ve set.
Now, what happened to me the other day was when I was riding over to my brother’s place. He and I live in absolute opposite ends of the city — he in the most northeastern section, I in the most northwestern section. I work smack dab in the middle, downtown, and between there and my brother’s is 30-square blocks of what’s essentially some of the poorest and most underprivileged in Canada. If you know where to avoid, you can go without ever seeing any of these people.
I don’t try to avoid it, I just go through. I always see really tragic things when I do and it keeps me appreciating the little I have. This time, though, I was stopped at a light and this old guy, about 70, was in a wheelchair, completely unable to use his hands, and could only pull himself forward using the toes on his right foot. He was literally moving about 2 feet a minute. Naturally, the light turned red with him in the middle of the street, and I got a solid green light to go. Meanwhile, he’s stopped, looks like he’s about to cry from exhaustion, just can’t go any further, and all these fucking people are walking past, ignoring him.
I was in a RAGE. I pulled my scooter over, got off, cursed, “You people ought to fucking help! Where the hell are manners gone?” Then I leaned over to the man and said, “May I push you across the street, sir?” And he went soft with relief. He just sighed, “Please?”
I had a bit of an argument with a couple punks on the corner after that, who seemed to think I was flaming them, and yeah, you know, I was. Just fucking standing there, doing nothing.
When I got over to my brother’s place, I saw my nephew standing there, and I sat him down. I said, “If you ever see a little old lady or a little old man who can’t get across the street or they’re taking too long, you HELP them. You hear me?”
I made sure he knew the distinction between “stranger danger” and helping a senior citizen who really does need the help. After all, that’s how I was taught.
In MY world, I was raised to help people. I was raised to give a hand and do the right thing. I was taught to say please and thank you, and I was told to hold doors open for others.
And I KNOW life moves fast, and I KNOW people are more rushed than they used to be. You know what? I don’t give a fuck. *I* find the time to still be polite. I find the time to thank people and make pleasant small talk. Why the hell don’t they?
So, kid, I say keep going. The thing about being a polite person and not behaving politely just because you’re not getting it in return is that you start to get bitter about it. It changes you. Cynicism finds you and apathy makes a home in you. Stay true to the person you are. Help others, be polite. You’ll one day be surrounded by a better class of people, by people who appreciate that in who you are. It will be a deciding factor on the kinds of engagements you’re invited to and the kinds of experiences you have. You’re still a kid, you’re in high school, and you’re stuck in a social world you have little say in. In a few years, that all changes.
I know I will not date a man who has no manners. I will watch how he behaves and treats others, and I’ll note whether he expresses gratitude for the little things I say and do for him, and if I don’t like what I see, I will walk.
Life’s too short to be with people who just don’t understand basic human decency. I figure that eliminates about 60% of the world from eligibility for my bed, but whatever. I’m fine with having high standards. Are you?
RANT: God's Asked Me to Whale On Yo Ass, MoFo!
There’s a lot of attention being paid to polygamy and bigamy at the present, thanks to the arrest of that uberFucker, Warren Steed Jeffs. I know there are a lot of polyamorists in my audience, so I’m going avoid starting a war of words just because I disagree with the lifestyle.
(Disagreement does not equal judgment, so spare me the sanctimony, thanks! Do what thou wilt; just don’t invite me to the party.)
I want to say one thing, and one thing only.
CNN’s been showing these slighted polygamists who feel the world is up against them. (I may not agree with it, but I don’t think it should be outright outlawed, but that’s another argument for another time.) Naturally, the butthead I saw was excusing or justifying his lifestyle because he believes he lives that lifestyle in praise of God or as a means of being closer to God, or even because God wills it as such. Insert the justification you like best.
I am sick and fucking tired of everyone justifying their actions because it’s “God’s will.” No, people, it’s not God’s will. If you are religious, then you understand the simple premise of the belief that God gave free will to man so that man may choose and thus ultimately secure his own fate. You have chosen your lifestyle — whether it be that of a polygamist or that of a bake-sale/PTA mom. Don’t fucking tell me you’re doing it for God. Do it because you choose to, and have the balls to own up to choice, public opinion be damned.
I could turn around tomorrow and buy stakes in the best Belgian chocolate company in this city and scarf cocoa up my fucking wazoo, turning myself into some 400-lb ball of flab and say, “But God made the beautiful cocoa bean and I am simply choosing to respect the beauty of his creation by indulging in it! I’m doing it for God! My rolls of fat are a testimony to his greatness!”
Nuh-uh, sweetums. I’m doing it ‘cos it tastes so fucking good and I’m not getting laid so if that means I indulge, then I indulge. But it’s my choice, and that’s enough justification. “Because I want to!”
I’m really goddamned tired of people not taking responsibility for their actions. You’ve chosen. You live it. Be proud of it. Don’t tell me it’s for a God you’ve never had the privilege of sharing a beer with. You don’t fucking know what He wants, if in fact He even exists, so don’t presume to excuse your actions through Him.
A nation of pansies, that’s what this is. Fuck, man. God wills it, therefore it must be so. If that’s the case, then know this: God gave you a spine, but you CHOOSE not to use it, you fucking amoebas. Get with the program or check the fuck out, but spare me more of this bullshit.
(This goes for anyone on any side of the “God wants it” argument, whether Poly or PTA or Pro-Life or whatever. I’m just sick of the argument. Personal responsibility’s like some distant figment of the land over yonder or something. I, for one, think it’s time we remember what the hell it once meant.)
Lightning Crashes… Or Something
There is a world of difference between saying what needs to be said and saying what you want to say. Words get taken the wrong way and intentions are often lost in the mix.
Hi, I’m Steff. I’m a compulsive foot-in-mouthist, and thinking before speaking is a lifelong fantasy I’ve yet to make true.
And you know what? Honestly, I just hope I keep on failing.
It’s so goddamned much fun when I get to actually say what I think. I do curtail it day to day, but not as much as you might think. I’m not one of these secret-other-self type bloggers who has a total alter ego they only bring out to play on a CPU. I don’t have to hit the bong or scarf a tab or guzzle a 2-4 in order to tap into that inner self. I just have to bite my fucking tongue sometimes so I can yield to convention. But, trust me, most people I know have known me to say incredibly crass things sometimes, and I’ve no qualms about playing a fool.
If there’s anything I miss about my old job, it’s that they’d long ago labelled me as “flippant” and knew me to be an absolute yutz at times, and, in fact, they embraced those moments of utter irrelevance. I miss that, and I miss the fact that I’m not feeling as comfortable being myself as I once was. I chalk it up to the oddities of the recent past: the lack of sex drive, the in-orbit levels of estrogen, the sub-terranean depths of depression, and all that shit. But I feel it coming back to me now. I’m waiting, like a lover in the night, I’m waiting for my own arrival, naked yet comfortable.
And that’s the thing, man. Being yourself. It ain’t just about saying what you’re thinking, it’s about feeling comfortable in your own skin and knowing, without a doubt, that the things you’re doing and thinking are all about who you are. It’s far easier said than done, and far harder to actualize than any of those fucking self-help gurus would have you believe.
Why’s that? Well, ‘cos we live in a shrink-wrapped society that thinks image is everything. Hell, it’s apologies-on-demand in our day and age. (I wrote a little ranty thing about just that on the other bloggie-poo of mine earlier today.)
Y’know, there’s two ways I write best: One, with music driving the cadence of everything I tap out, and two, like I am now, seated in unnatural (to you) silence — my little hearing aids turned off, or not even inserted in my ears. I find that if, one way or the other, I drown out the world, that all that’s left is the rat-tatty-tat of my heart and my fingers on the keyboard. Gone is the judgment, the cynicism, the self-doubt, the angst, the bafflement, the groan’n’drone of the world beyond my far too thin windowpanes. I can give in to autolatry and isolation, and, for once, being myself is just a little easier.
I have the misfortune of working at a company with nice people, but with extreme political aspects to them. And with politics comes correctness, and with correctness comes a realization that I might not ever fit in as I’d like to. But, then, I haven’t been there long, and it took me more than a year to gain the unequivocal fondness of my last employers. (But I was in a bad, bad place when I started that job — borderline alcoholic and drug addict, really.) I suspect I’ll beat the living shit out of that time-lapse this time around, but OHMIGOD does it feel like forever.
And I’ve been thinking about this for a little bit today, how weird it all is when we lose touch with ourselves. It’s like trying to dial up a friend and stoke an old relationship. It ain’t gonna be all love’n’kisses as soon as that cup’o’joe settles on the table between you, you know. Takes a little massagin’ of egos and checking in and tuning up and all, don’t you find? Yet we think that because we’re all of a sudden aware of the distance between who we are and who we’re being that there’s some kinda mental Band-aid we can slap on that gaping psychic wound and suddenly be our uber-ally self all over again. Not gonna fuckin’ happen, sweetcheeks — try though you might.
So, that’s where I am. I know who I am but I know who I’m seeming to be, and who I’m seeming to be’s just gotten her eviction notice and I want her ass on outta here, but I know there’s a holding period before that’s gonna happen. Meanwhile, just call me Marcellus Wallace, ‘cos I’m about due to get medieval on that waste-ass tenant if she ain’ packin’ in a friggin’ hurry, baby.
I’m trying to remember when in the hell it all shifted for me. When was it I lost touch with all the little bitty bits o’ Steff that make me grin when I’m alone? At some point during my recently RIP’d relationship, to be sure, and no, I’m not about to blame the ex for causing me to go AWOL. Sure as shit weren’t his fault, not one iota. He liked the chick I am, not the chick I became, and that’s fact that I don’t doubt. The problem was never him, the problem was that I, like most chicks have a tendency to do, managed to fall into that trap of being what I thought was the right thing to be in a relationship, and somehow, that coupled with the estrogen depression and the prevalence of strife and upheaval in my oh-so-tumultuous little dramatic life somehow sent this kick-ass, fun to be with, always witty, always snappy chick somewhere way the hell out into the stratosphere.
And, dude, it sucked!
There’s nothing (NOTHING!!!) worse than waking up with the side of you that you just don’t like. There’s nothing (NOTHING!!!) cooler than waking up with a grin on your face ‘cos nothing turns you on better than liking who you are at 6:53 am, all right?
And you don’t get to be that person if all you’re ever doing is kow-towing to convention and appeasing all the little perfect (read: no fun, dry, unenviable) people around you. You get to be that person when you say things that catch yourself and others off-guard and you bring a grin to their face. You get to be that person when that gleam in your eye sparkles and you find yourself walking down the street with an unwarranted grin.
Ah, well, I don’t know why I’m writing this, and I don’t give a fuck about it, either. I just felt like it. That’s reason enough, no? I wish like nothing else I had Live’s Lightning Crashes somewhere on this harddrive, but no. I do not. If you read this in the next couple of hours, (say, before 2am PST) perhaps you could email me the song and I can rock-the-fuck-out before work in the morning. Not that I’m condoning piracy. Okay, fuck it. I’m condoning piracy. Sign me up, matey, and watch me rock and roll on the pitch of those waves.
You asked? Some thoughts on "cuckolding"
I was asked a while back what my take on cuckolding is.
I didn’t ask what the reader’s interpretation of the word is, but there’s a historical definition of it meaning that the male in a relationship is faithful while the woman can do whatever or whomever she likes. It’s, I guess, a sample of “reverse” sexual dominance played out in a social manner.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I’m old-fashioned. I’m a one-guy/one-gal kind of chick and I don’t foresee that changing. Relationships are hard enough for me without throwing potential mind-fucks into the equation.
That being said, whatever the hell gets your rocks off, man. If you’re in a relationship and you’ve set ground rules that state Sunday nights you have mashed potatoes, Mondays are for football, and, oh, yeah, you can fuck whoever you want as long as it doesn’t interfere with your plans as a couple, then so be it.
I don’t really see where my opinion matters one damned bit. I’m sure there are people who make lifestyle choices and then feel awkward for living outside the norm and that they’d like someone like me to come along and say “Hurrah for individuality!” but the fact is, you got to find your approval from within, and what I think, or anyone else for that matter, shouldn’t impact you in the least. So don’t take offense but I think it’s all bullshit, myself.
I will never buy into polyamory as a lifestyle. I don’t think I could ever forgive a man for cheating on me. I have never cheated on a man – not even a kiss or a flirtatious email has passed from me when I’m dedicated to a lover. I will do everything in my power to ensure I remain faithful in any relationship I’m in. I believe in monogamy, and I think monogamy fucking rocks.
That being said, relationships are hard. There are times when they cause nothing but heartbreak, and times when being with that person can take you lower than you’d have thought possible, but that’s just more of what life really is. It’s adversity that’s occasionally peppered with greatness.
I think swinging, polyamory, and all that shit are ways people have conceived of to take the sting out of the difficulty that comes with monogamy. I believe they probably truly do love the primary person in their relationship, but that the hard times overwhelm them, so incorporating others into the relationship is their way of minimizing the emotional intensity. I think some people have issues with monogamy. I think some people simply have what society deems as loose morals. I think some people are just scared to be with one person, ‘cos if that person ups and walks, then what would they be left with? And naturally, some people are just scared of being alone.
Am I oversimplifying things? Oh, probably. But that’s what those of us who’ll never, ever understand it do. Am I judging them? I suppose you could make the argument that I am, but I’m not. I simply don’t understand those lifestyle choices and never will. I don’t think I need to apologize for my lack of comprehension, and I certainly won’t pretend to understand it when I can’t.
I’m no idealist. I don’t believe there’s only one person who’s right for me. I’m sure that with a little compromise and a lot of understanding that there are a lot of men I could make a life with. There is no one kind of man I fall for, and there’s not just one fit for me. I’ve fallen hard for more than one man in my life, but that doesn’t mean I can’t commit to just one.
I think monogamy’s a pretty sexy journey – getting to know the little things that make someone tick can be a fun and interesting trip to take. And I’ve had my heart broken. Some days I feel like my heart’s been broken so often that I’m simply broke, and other days I feel like I’ve somehow Krazy-Glued it back together enough that it’s got some bounce in it. And yet I’m still willing to put all my eggs in one basket. I’ll take that chance.
I’ll tell you one thing, though. It bothers me there’s a term for a relationship in which a woman is the one who sleeps around and not the man. I was talking about the duplicity of women’s sexuality the other night with a chick and we reached consensus about just how much we both despised the word “cougar,” for example.
If you’ve been locked in a closet these many years, a Cougar is said to be a woman who seeks out younger men. I think it’s bullshit. Men are seldom ever called “dirty old men” unless they more than double the woman’s age. Otherwise it’s accepted practice that an older man sees a younger woman.
When I was aggressively playing the dating game last summer, fall, and winter, I definitely hooked up with some younger guys. (The funniest account is here.) I’m 32 for a few more weeks, and I got it on with a couple guys in their mid-20s, and I was labeled a cougar. What the fuck? A five-year age spread and I’m somehow some amoral woman with little regard for age?
Fuck you and your urban dictionary, buddy boy. I’m sick of sexual terms that distinguish women as being somehow amoral for engaging in the same acts that men have been committing for centuries.
Equality’s come a hell of a long way, but some things still need to change. This is the first and last time you’ve heard the words cuckolding and cougar on this site, people. Women are sexual creatures and it’s time we stopped apologizing for it.
Of Groundhogs and Loathing
I just finished watching the last 30 minutes of Groundhog Day with Bill Murray, and, well, this is a weird one, but I think it’s one of my favourite romantic comedies.
Right now, I long for a little kissing and lighthearted fun. That’d be nice. Not to be had, but it’d be nice.
Something about Groundhog Day hits the spot today. I’d realized earlier this week that I’d sunk about as low as I’ve ever sunk. I’m not accustomed to being cruel or mean or angry, and I’ve been feeling that way too much of late. I really, really hate feeling negative things, but acting on them, why, that’s just as low as it gets.
I’m not above fallibility. Wish I was, but I come with the full range of human emotions, from dishonesty through to loyalty, they’re all nestled within me. Normally, my moral compass overrides the bad shit ‘cos I’m typically a very good person. Lately, it’s felt like night and day, depending on my mood.
I seem to be starting to stabilize more. I’ve made the choice that I’m getting off birth control after a couple friends have suggested that this week, which, for some reason, just totally escaped my consciousness as a choice. Throughout ALL the shit that has come down, I’ve been on the pill, and while I consider myself one of the toughest, most resilient people I know, I’ve been anything but that of late. I want to have something to blame, and maybe the pill’s a good thing to use in that capacity. Maybe, though, it really is to blame.
(And while I’m being all hard on myself, don’t think for a minute I’m not impressed with my ability to get through certain things that came my way since June… I’m quite proud of myself in some regards, but I’m disappointed that, in the end, I did start to sink beneath myself.)
I’m supposed to resume the pill tonight, but I’m not going to. Instead, I’ll take a break and let it flush out of my system. Once fall passes and winter dawns, I might decide to resume the pill.*
At the moment, I’m not sexually active, but I still consider going off the pill to be a major pain in the ass because I typically get first-day-of-period cramps that leave me fetally balled on my couch, wincing in agony as my body proceeds to fully explore the potential of cramps. I get the world’s worst first-day cramps. I was once in enough pain that I thought of going to the hospital to get a sedative. I’d really rather not return to those cramps…
…but if the alternative is beginning to hate myself, then I know the choice I need to make. It’s been a week since I’ve had a pill, and since then, I’ve slowly started to climb out of the depressive cesspool that has been home for the last three months — which is coincidentally the length of my last cycle, thanks to the brilliance of trying to suppress my period.
Today’s to be a cycling day peppered by a four-hour stint of work. I have a project to do, and when I’m done, I’m gone, even if that’s less than four hours. I don’t care. Right now, I’ll do what it takes to enjoy myself, because that’s where I find the self-love. If I can have a good time on my own, I can enjoy myself anywhere, any time, and hopefully with anyone. It’s that simple.
Groundhog Day‘s great because Bill Murray also hits self-loathing bottom in that movie. He does everything destructive he can, and then, when that’s through, he seeks to improve himself. Me, I’ve been pretty destructive this past month. One ANGRY woman, man. I’m glad I’ve done nothing drastic because there were moments I was a little nervous for myself. The further I get from it (and I’m not that removed from it yet), the more dark I realize things had been for a while there. I too now wish to improve myself. Steps are being taken and I suspect positive results are already beginning to show in small, inconsequential ways.
I’m sure there are people out there who are forever on an even keel, and I hate them because I’m jealous of them, because I’m not one of them and likely never will be. I tend to be a little more even than this, but there’s often a potential air of volatility to me. That’s a negative, but I often overcome my negatives with my positives — of which I like to think there are many. I’m starting to embrace this difficult time instead of loathing it, because I think I’m heading down the right path — setting up counselling, lowering my expectations, focusing on the little things that need doing so the big things don’t loom so large.
Right now, everything’s worth doing if only it means I stop seeing shadows, you know? Whatever you do, don’t call me Punxsatawney Steff.
*Don’t ever just stop in the middle of a pill cycle or you could fuck yourself over worse than the pills have done to you. Always consult a doctor. I finished my cycle; I’m just choosing not to resume. Despite knowing that I can indeed do this, I’m still seeing my doctor Monday to clue him in and touch base on the evil shit that’s come down in the last few weeks.