[begin preface]
so, i want to write about three different women, but, generally speaking, writing about women seems to be a tough subject, cause like everyone gets all upset if you say the wrong thing about women, or "like, why do you need to comment on other women, at all?," you know? ugh.
one woman is quite famous, because, well, these days, for being "hoisted by her own petard," as it were, lol.
one woman is supposedly a woman and a stranger (to me) who posts to the social media platform, instagram.
one woman is a young cojobber at my jobplace.
my goal is not to defend, put-down, embarrass, compare, etc., etc., etc., any of these women.
for the various earth-modes through which i experience each of these people is not only vastly different but also, important to remember as i say the things i'm about to say with regards to myself; yes, i am going to be talking about myself as i write about these women, cause, like, this is all whatever. okay? gah.
okay, i'm going to start writing now.
[end preface]
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| In the darkness of night, she sits, laptop aglow, her sleepless eyeballs blasted by the screen as they roll around her head, searching, scanning, staring into a future that cannot be known, for The Future cannot be told. |
when i read that email that blake lively tapped out to the p.g.a., in what i imagine was, the middle of the night, during, what i can only imagine being, a hellscape of anxiety, i felt anxious.
anxiety is a feeling with which i am all-too familiar.
i think that being left on the doorstep of an orphanage and shipped internationally to live with a family that is not your family, at an age when you can remember all of this happening to you is a childhood that is ripe for the shaping by anxiety.
but what do i know, lol.
if you haven't watched the movie Inside Out 2, i would recommend a watch.
whatever faults the movie may hold, or whatever, the overwhelming message of the movie is one about anxiety, what it is, and more-importantly, what to do with it.
i've been lucky enough, in my life thus far, to have found a path that has led me to both recognize my anxiety and ease it.
these days, i am at a point where i can quickly pinpoint exactly the moment i feel anxious. a few indicators exist for me, but mostly, it's a very specific loop for me, mentally. as soon as i can hear/see that a thought is looping, i know, immediately, that i am anxious about something. sometimes it's as straight forward as the thought that is on loop, other times, it's much more difficult to decipher exactly what i am anxious about, but i know i need to figure it out, quick, so that i can deal with it.
for me, anxiety's natural path is a downward spiral.
dealing with it swiftly, is a must.
dealing with it, for me, means taking some sort of action.
the type of anxiety that i am dealing with determines the type of action that is required, and sometimes, the action that is required is a lengthy email, but of course, the email never gets sent.
and this is when i saw myself in blake lively.
i've written many-an unhinged email, late in the dark night, because my anxiety was eating me whole, and the only action i could take, was an email. luckily for me, i have never sent any of these emails, because the release of writing them was enough for me.* generally speaking, writing is an extremely effective anxiety-reducing action for me.
other anxiety-inducers require different forms of action to ease, and so i have a long (ever-expanding) list of outlets through which i may take some form of action in order to ease my anxiety.
when i feel anxious in a way that makes me feel "stressed out"—a feeling of a sort of pressure building, etc.—i exercise. these days i mostly run, but ideally, i'd dance, again (soon, dahling, so so soon).
when i feel anxious in a very personal way, like my ego is all wrapped up in itself as if i have enemies or a sort of paranoid feeling, i cook some sort of korean food. i feed my soul. this is also why i begin to feel anxious when there is no 김치 in the house.**
when i feel anxious in a "The Future is going to eat me whole!" typa-way, i stretch my body through a combination of dance and yoga stretches.
etc.
etc.
etc.
i legitimately do not care what happens to blake lively or her career. i never cared. nevertheless, the fucking mess that she's in has, obviously, infiltrated the media, and so, generally speaking, i couldn't care less about her, as an actress/celebrity or whatever, but i cannot help but care about her as a person, a female person in an industry that continues to chew up and spit out a very specific type of woman. and so, yea, i have no opinion about whether she's "right" or "wrong" with regards to the legal drama unfolding for the public, but i do know that she's not wrong, as a woman, in hollywood. ya know?
blake lively, no matter what you say, is/has been mistreated, overlooked, etc., etc., etc., in hollywood by the men who run hollywood, because EVERY WOMAN IN HOLLYWOOD HAS BEEN MISTREATED BY SOME MAN IN HOLLYWOOD. like, duh. and hollywood punishes the women who make a stink about it, especially if they come for their entitlements.
and i imagine that women in hollywood feel powerless and anxious, like, 24/7. how could they not? the entire power structure has been built to do just that ... erode the power of women by telling tales of the "greatness of man," lol, as if a single man has ever come into being not-through a woman, oh wait, that's who adam is, because he is "the one" who didn't come from the womb of a woman, because he was created by god "himself," through divine creation, and then, the woman "appeared" as an afterthought, as some lesser part of man, to painfully (as punishment for being the sexy temptress) birth the rest of humanity.
every woman christian is just acting, right? out of fear for her own life, right? i mean, you cannot be a woman and a christian, can you?
which brings me to ...
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| "You cannot call yourself an intersectional feminist and also support adoption." (on ig) |
JESUS-H CHRIST. i swear to you, this is a real post, by someone i only assume to be real.
i, obviously, do not know this person, in person, and so, perhaps this is just some account to rile people about some ridiculous shit, but seriously, this post is unhinged.
i am in no place to comment on the ways in which various adoptees move through this world, but i cannot support an adoptee who wants to make illegal, adoption.
like, what the fuck?
in my mind, since this person is just an esoteric ig account, i feel the pain of the writer. whether or not the writer is currently suffering this pain or is simply writing, thereby sharing the fruits of the pain now, is beyond me, but the pain is real, or at least, it was, at some point in time, and the real pain being shared on this account is deep.
i feel their pain.
and they are either really good at putting their past pain into words, or they are currently in this much pain and are expressing it.
to me, it reads as current pain, because there's so much lashing out at "them." the posts give a lot of power to some being or entity outside of the person who is posting these posts. the posts give a lot of power to some being or entity that can somehow "accept" the poster, and then the poster will be "allowed to be."
for me, the pain is a little unfamiliar, because the pain is being directed toward beings and entities that cannot heal the pain, for the pain exists within the person posting the posts, but again, i do not know the poster, so i do not know who the person posting is, and since the posts are so off-putting, i have not done any further digging into their story, or whatever, and i do not wish to spend any time deciphering whether or not the posts reflect the poster or are mere means toward influencer-like ends, etc.
in the end, the mode through which i am experiencing this "person" is one about which i do not give a fuck, but also, i cannot help but feel the pain that's ooozing through every post; it's angry, heavy, miserable, and spreading.
nevertheless,
i have a soft spot for those of us who do not quite fit the Bed of Procrustes, whatever that means in whatever timespace in which you're currently existing.
as an outlier, i find myself bumping into a lot of young people who don't quite "fit in" to their social groups, boxes, etc. i used to think that i attracted them, cause i'm "weird" or whatever, but as i've grown older, i've realized that i am out here, existing in the wild, "going against the grain," "swimming upstream," etc., etc., etc., whatever cliche thing is the most cliche thing about people who are both excluded from the "inside" and who actively reject being invited into the "inside."
and a lot of young women find themselves out here, because they are exploring their individuality, etc., etc., etc., but a lot of these young women do not stay out here, because they are not truly outliers; they're wanderers who eventually find their path within the "inside."
every once in a while, however, i strike gold, and i bump into a young woman who is both an outlier and enjoys finding herself out here.
they are the rarest of women.
they are always beautiful.
they are the "stuff of life" about which everyone speaks.
they grow.
they change.
they become.
and this adorable cojobber at my jobplace is an outlier, but when we met, she did not seem to enjoy that she is, in fact, an outlier.
it seemed like a point of shame, not to say that it is or that if it was it no longer is, this is all from my point of view.
recently, though, i've had a hunch that maybe she finds me a bit scary,*** and so, i thought of something i might say to her to communicate that i think she's doing a great job, and so, a week or so ago, after a big corporate visit, i asked her how the visit went (i had already been informed by the big boss, but i wanted to see what she'd say), and she said that we did a good job, and i said, "Yea, that's all because of you, [name redacted]****! You've been working your butt off!" to which she replied by trying to shift the "blame" on one of the young-male managers-in-training, and i was like, "No. Don't do that. You've been working really hard, and so, you're the reason we did so well on the visit."
she didn't want to believe me, and so, i made sure i brought it up again a few days later, and i even included that my department backup also thinks that she's the reason we did so well (cause my backup wholly agreed), and before she could respond, i reiterated that it wasn't "that guy," it "was you!"
and for the past week or so, she's been "around" me a lot, lol.
and then, earlier tonight when i went into my job for a short shift, she was sitting in my office.
she has grown, a lot, and i enjoy who she's becoming, and i cannot help but feel like she's enjoying herself, too, and i am the lucky one who gets a front-row seat to her growth.
*i have, obviously, written unhinged emails and sent them, but by the sheer force of good fortune, i have never sent (by accident or otherwise) the anxiety-fueled ones; thank you, Ladybug!
**this is an anxiety-inducer all its own, and in my mind, for good reason; i think that "no 김치" brings up the feelings of abandonment, the unfamiliar, my childhood trauma; when i was adopted, there was no 김치 to be found.
***cause i am; cause an inch is too much to give, to just anyone, especially if i hate you.
****it's important to state the name of the person to whom you are giving a compliment, lest the compliment be perceived as offhanded, diluted by the idea of it being for/about anyone.