Let's Make a Night of It!

I need to pack.  I also need to clean the kitchen, wash the dishes, do a number on the cat box, change my bed sheets and put the laundry away.  I've been thus thwarted all day so I decided to go to dance anyway.  And now, write this.

The first thing I noticed as I boarded the number 66 was a body lying across the aisle.  I stopped and stared and heard a few titters among the onlookers.  This was a show they'd been enjoying at every stop.  I decided that between standing and staring or sitting beyond the body, the latter was preferable.  So I walked down the aisle and purposefully stepped over the torso semi-dressed in navy.

I say "semi-dressed" because as I turned to take my seat I was treated to an unwelcome view of most of this man's ass.  No, I couldn't see this persons's face, but judging by the ass and pot belly it seemed safe to say the person was male.  I watched reactions as others boarded the bus feeling ill at ease that we were all assuming this person was passed out from alcohol and not that maybe he'd had a heart attack. "Noooo, he's passed out from being too damn drunk" people assured me.  And I trusted that they knew more about 'too damn drunk' than I do.

On my way home I decided to wait for the trusty 66 at the stop west of Rhythm.  It isn't quite as close but I had time to kill and wanted a change.  A short man in his early 30s stepped around the corner with a cane and started to try to engage me in conversation.

"Hey, you dun mine if I... got any... I seem to have... ???"  He started many questions at once but seemed unable to finish them.

He asked if the bus was still running.  Looking at the bus just behind him on the other side of the street I assured him it was.  He said something about losing his bus pass, mumbled something else, and generally blathered.  The next thing I could make out of his words was "you know what a faker is?  I'm a faker" as he pulled a plastic folder out of his pocket and got his bus pass out of it.

He continued to regale me with statements about how he never made it past the 9th, 8th grade, but damn there were some fine looking chicks in his class and they threw him out for being a gang member.  Do I want to see a cane dance?  Do I know who Dr. Dre is?  Do I know who Ice Cube is?  He doesn't like heights so he don't want to, you know... elevation? and heights?  Yeah, no, don't want to be... He's not drunk, or high.  Indians you know, I mean they drink a lot of stuff... water... soda... iced tea... Do I know Ice-T?  But he never made it past 9th, 8th grade.  Have I ever met a wet native american before?  A dumb Indian?  They threw him out ... well, it was discrimination cuz he's a gang member.  Have I ever seen a gang member before?  Why am I... what?  it's raining?  Do I want to go to a wet concert with him?  Can he have my number?  Can he use my phone to call his mother?  Aw dang, he's like 31 and never asked someone for her number before and ... now... she said no.  He's a wet Indian.  He's like not into... like smacking girls and stuff... he's into you know, intelligent girls.  Is this gonna work?  This ... see, I give you my number and you give me yours...

In the midst of this he threw his cane in the garbage can.  He proceeded to get on the bus after me.  I stood close to the night security officer.  I was very relieved when he got off two stops before mine.

Why I Do Not Smile

The man at the back of the bus has a black tattoo on his neck.  I unconsciously try to figure out what the image is as my brain chews on other sensory information.

"Hey!  Smile; you're beautiful" the man calls to me.

I hadn't been aware of doing anything particular with my face, although I suppose he singled me out because I was looking the way of his tattoo.  I did not find his comment creepy.  I can see where I could easily have felt so, but I didn't.  I tried hard not to smile from embarrassment.  To smile when commanded to do so feels insulting somehow.  It feels like giving acknowledgement to the idea that another has power over me, that I didn't agree to give.

However, I did say "thank you" and allowed, not so much a smile as a softening to occur in his general direction.  I didn't want him to have further purpose in engaging me.

What I did find creepy was the man sitting next to him who started to speculate on why I might not be smiling.  I heard as much as "she's just pretending to be living with some guy" before I forcibly excluded their conversation from my ears by focusing on the hum of the bus.

Why do you need to make up stories about me and why you don't get the response you want from me?  Why must it revolve around a situation that I'm in and not your choice of how to interact with me?  I have answers to these questions; but the answers I can think of make it sad, a sad thing of the world and of you.

Women Can Creep Too

In conversation with a male friend of mine, he shared with me these creepy stories of experiences he's had with women.  He graciously agreed that I could share them with you all.

#1  Date Scalpers

"I was contacted by someone on Plenty of Fish.  A couple of emails and a brief phone conversation, and we decided to meet for a drink.  I have a rule about first-dates.  They should be "dutch".  It is a huge peeve with me that so many women out there seem to believe that a dating should be a free coffee/drink/dinner/movie.  Bad on me for not bringing it up before that evening, because this one didn't even bring her wallet along.  What a disaster - her photo on PoF was *significantly* out of date.  Found we had nothing at all to talk about.  Let alone the fact that she spent as much time there talking with her various friends than sitting with me.  I obviously got stuck with the tab.  I had also agreed to pick her up - which meant driving all the way across town.  The drive back to her place was pretty quiet.  I really had nothing left to say.  Drop her off - and I'd driven about 3 blocks when the phone rang.  It was her.

Me:  "Hello?"
Her:  "Where are you?"
Me:  "I'm driving home"
Her:  "Why?"
Me:  "Uh - I just dropped you off?"
Her:  "Oh..."
Me:  "Obviously you meant to dial someone else.  Have fun on your next date tonight.  And please don't call me again"

Date-scalpers.  Hate that."

My dear people, if you find a date isn't going so well, try very hard to be a kind and tactful person.  This may include letting the date run its course while you try very hard not to yawn in the middle of the other person's stories.  This may include telling your date that you're not feeling a connection and you appreciate their time but you're going to go home.  This can not include ignoring your date and talking to your friends instead.

I also agree with my friend, first dates should be dutch.  This allows everyone to be independent, self reliant, feel free to choose whatever course of action during the date feels right...  In other words, there's no tacit coercion from the one who paid that the other now owes something, there's no tacit coercion from the other that there's something wrong with the date or the people involved if the payer doesn't want to pay for everything, self-reliance and independence is sexy and sane.   

Oh, and please, don't call your most recent, bombed date when you mean to call someone else.

#2  If You NEED to Date... You're Not In a Good Place to Date.

"I went out with a woman three times back in December.  Met once for coffee.  A movie.  Then she made me dinner, which was actually quite good.
Following the dinner she emailed, telling me that if we were to go out again, she couldn't help but "develop deeper feelings", and couldn't see me again unless I reciprocated those feelings. 
Third date?  While I was thinking, "But you don't even know me...", I responded that though I had enjoyed her company, [fill-in general "I don't think so" terms.....]

This week (six months later) I received an email from her:
"I'm not a freak anymore if you would want to try hanging out again. I won't make the same mistakes."

More desperate and sad than creepy, but creepy nonetheless..."

Well, I guess men and women (and potentially transpeople) do it -come on too strong that is.  The thing that strikes me about these stories is that the woman in each case was creepy about something having to do with mental or emotional connection.  Most of the stories I've shared about interactions with men, have them being creepy in matters of physical connection -i.e. sex/sexual conquest/the body as object or possession.  Several anecdotal stories does not make research, but I would fathom from generalities we have about the sexes, that this kind of split is common. 

What also interests me is what is the same about these stories of women and stories I've shared about men.  In nearly each case the creepitude comes about when one person is trying to use or make another person fulfill his/her needs.  Needs: powerful buggers.

Doctors Have Needs Too

My mission today: create a map of 36 different medical drop-in clinics and auto-body/collision repair shops, go to them and drop off marketing materials for work. 

Despite the fighting I did with google maps and mapquest, I was able to get on the road around noon today.  On my list, Dr J's Auto Clinic.  His sign has a stethoscope on it.

"Hi I'm from Masterpiece Medical Massage.  We specialize in car accident victims.  I have some marketing materials here; do you think I could leave them with you, in a waiting area perhaps?"

After determining with a glance, that he didn't really have a waiting area -only a few chairs with minimal padding lined up along the walls- I waited for him to suggest something.  He took the book and cards I handed him and suggested I tack the cards up on a cork board.

"So, you just do medical massage?" he asked coming around the counter.

*Feigning innocence* "As opposed to what?"

"Well, massage for, relaxation..."

"Well, you know the business model works best when we can bill auto insurance.  Although we also take a letter of protection from lawyers, you know, if someone is waiting to settle their case."

"So, you never do other massages?"

"Oh, well, you can call and ask.  Sometimes, if the person is someone we know or recommended by a current client we'll see someone who hasn't been in an accident."

In the future, I think I should be more direct and just say we never do happy endings.  Period.  Why should I play along like I don't know what is being talked about when someone's being indirect and rather creepy?

Fuel For Fear

I chose a Smith's gas station.  I figured that in 4 months of living here using my Smith's grocery card, with no car of my own, I'd probably amassed a good discount on Smith's gas.  Was the place closed though?  The booth was dark, no other cars were in the lot; but then it was 11pm.  I drove in and found that paying by card was still possible.

After fighting with my rewards card a few minutes, everything started flowing normally.  I had just decided to stop the pump (it's the company car, I didn't think I needed to fill it entirely) when around between the two pumps a guy appeared and asked for $0.40 to make a phone call.

I froze, scared into silence.  The only thing I could think was to extricate the car from the pump and get going.  The man said something about not trying to scare me or something and, to his credit, he did not approach me further.

"If you don't want to, you can just say" he offered.

It's not that I wouldn't have given him $0.40.  It was the threat I felt, even though, in retrospect, he didn't seem to pose one.  If the money had been in my pocket, I would have fished it out, though I would have felt scared to go close enough to him to hand it over.  The change was in my bag in the car though.  That meant I would have had to turn my back on him, and climb partially into the car to retrieve it.  The thought of letting him out of my sight so close to me was overwhelming.  What if he had a gun?  What if he attacked me?  But more to the crux of what I was feeling, "what if I feel more fear?"

Perhaps those thoughts sound over the top.  It's sad for the many people who are safe in this world that they may get reactions of fear directed towards them because of the acts of few others.  I felt bad (after getting over the fear) that this man, whom I otherwise would have helped, instead got a fearful picture of himself mirrored back.  I hoped he wouldn't think it was because he had brown skin.  I've been fearful of white women in similar situations.  Still, safe doesn't mean aware or acting in smart ways.  He could take home the awareness that approaching someone late, in the dark, without anyone else around, can produce fear. 

It's been pointed out to me that I had a gas nozzle in my hand which would have been an effective deterrent should it have come to that.  I suppose this is true, but in the midst of the "fight, flight or freeze" reaction, this isn't something that would have occurred to me.  Had it, my thinking would have befuddled the idea in that I would still have had to turn my back on him, get partially into the car, and then go near him to give him the change -none of which would have made toting a gas nozzle plausible.  And it brings up another aspect which is that I was embarrassed that I was afraid of him.  I didn't want him to know.  I thought it would offend him -and people's reactions to me when they are offended upset me.

"Yeah... not right now."  I replied.  "Thanks for being cool."

I was thanking him for not getting mad at me for my reaction and my refusal to help.  I was thanking him for offering me not just a way out, but a way to talk, to end the situation and the fear, which I couldn't come up with myself.

I wonder that people who find themselves the recipients of my fear would lay responsibility for this issue back on me.  I agree that my fear is not always applied to harmful situations, and I am working on it.  But one can't choose when to apply fear to situations that are similar in make up.  Those who intend to do harm don't approach you with that intent clearly stated.  And fear is a chemical reality.  When the pathway gets triggered, there it goes.  It isn't a choice.

I expect it then comes down to whether or not you/I want someone to have to deal with potential fear, regardless of whether we are intending harm.

Shoot The Slut

Okay, this is actually a link to share.  Here it is:
http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/blog/2011/06/12/21st-century-backlash-about

The crux of the article (since I know it's tough to read linked articles) is that a police officer in NYC stopped a Dutch woman for wearing a short skirt while riding a bicycle under the pretense that her amazing womanly flesh would be distracting and cause car accidents and the like.  (Short in the picture in that article looks like upper mid thigh.)  He let her go with only remonstration upon hearing that she's not from NYC.  Like... you can ticket for wearing a short skirt anyway?

The article does a good job of outlining the usual reasons this is ridiculous and insulting.  Here's an additional thought.  Why is a woman's body so dangerously distracting that it would cause people (read: men sexually interested in women) so much distraction?

I think there's something to be said for biology.  After all, hormones are powerful chemicals.  But I don't think there's anything in androgen and testosterone that makes someone turn their eyes off the road.  Distracting?  Okay sure.  In fact, I would find someone wearing a burka distracting  because it's not something I see every day here.  However, I don't think that potential distraction alone (especially for something you probably see 50 times a day in NYC) can account for such a danger.

I would suggest that sex (or desire of) as an accepted excuse for doing something wrong or incorrectly has more to do with how we think about sex.  How many people (men, women and all the other genders possible) get as much sex as they want?  Not many, I'd say.  And yes, I include women in that based on people I know, although I notice that women hold that desire differently than most men.

What keeps people from having the sex they want?  The way we think about sex is very limiting.  Starting with ideas around sex being bad in circumstances before marriage, or for pleasure, or for money; and going all the way to ideas that if one is straight then sex with someone of similar biology is impossible to enjoy and that natural sexual urges are "abnormal" or "sick".  In other words, much of our thinking about sex is that it's bad.

I realize that this is a very edgy thing to talk about, but what about adults who are turned on by children?  Okay, very clear here: having sex with, having revealing pictures of, or making those pictures of children is against the law.  But, behaving within the limits of the law, someone could still have their fantasies and enjoy those.  The creepitude factor comes into this scenario largely when we see evidence of someone using someone else (a child in this case) for their own purposes and with disregard to the other person's needs and welfare.  The extra creepitude around kids is the fact that they have much less power and much less ability to say what they want and have that respected than an adult has.  Therefore it would be super difficult to ever have a situation where no coercion or power difference was present with a child.

Whatever your turn on is, if you and any partners you have can say that your expression of it feels good and only good/other positive feelings, it's probably okay.  (Again, kids don't legally have a voice in saying sex with them is okay, so that doesn't count.)

Ideas that there are right and wrong ways to have sex often center around actual activities.  Like, "it's wrong to hit someone for sexual/sensual pleasure".  My response to that is "maybe".  It's wrong if the other person didn't consent.  It's wrong if it feels bad to anyone involved.  But if it feels good and the other person has literally said "yes, this is something I want" (and he is not under the influence, and and not feeling coerced, and is in his right mind)... then have at it!  So, I say that "right and wrong" ways to have sex should center around intent and consent rather than the activity involved. 

Ideas that some of what we may want are "bad" keep us from having sex.  Not being able to think outside our "box" about sex also does.  Thinking about sex with all that charged emotion -it's bad in so many cases, I can only have sex in this one way, no one ever wants to have sex with me, my body has to be kept covered- calls up an obsession and a dichotomy when media feeds us sexual images nonstop.  We have these messages that sex and our bodies are bad, but that we should be having sex all the time and we should be sexy.

What would happen if we were able to relax about it all?  What would happen if ideal images of sex and sexiness weren't fed to us by media or other people?  What would happen if sex was something we experienced as part of ourselves and together, openly but without forcefully putting our experiences in the way of others?  What would happen if sex was an expression, a communication, a pleasure, rather than a conquest, a battle, a never ending search?  What would happen if the police officer could say to a woman wearing a short skirt that he feels turned on by the way she looks without an expectation around her reaction and without trying to get anything from her, even attention?  What would happen if the woman felt appreciated by the respect in his voice and not like she was being objectified or asked to take care of any of his needs?

Starting At The Top

I was in Albertson's today to buy a bus pass.  Handy that they sell them at Albertson's since I was nowhere near the Transportation Center and wouldn't be able to be until after they were already closed.

Walking out I noticed a man who gave me a visual once over.  I didn't notice which "type" of look this was because I was trying desperately to not give him any encouragement.  There's nothing like eye contact that encourages people to say or do creepy things.

"Nice hat, Baby..." he leered.

In retrospect (where quips and comebacks are always on cue), I wish I'd said "It is and I'm not a baby" or "I'm not a baby" or just walked on without saying anything.  Instead I said a curt "Thank you" and walked past without looking at him.

Someday in the future a response I'm proud of will just fall out of my mouth at the right time.

Edit:  The next day I got onto the bus on my way to work.  A man likely around the same age as the one previously in this story (though maybe a little older) said to me "Nice hat, Ma'am", to which I turned, looked him in the eyes and said "Thank you."  He then went on to remark about how even the ladies in NM wear hats and isn't that funny?