Now Playing: Abraham's Daughter by Arcade Fire (just as the angel cried for the slaughter, Abraham's daughter raised her voice)
I get picked on a lot for being a feminist. It's normally the first things people attack when they're in the mood to attack me - as if standing up for women's rights is the most offensive thing I've ever done. They ask me if I'm a feminist in the same way you would ask someone if they're a rapist or a pedophile.
And the answer is always the same. Yes, I'm a feminist. You got a problem with that?
I am not ashamed of my beliefs and values. I am not ashamed of being a feminist. Women who aren't feminists aren't women. People who aren't feminists aren't people. To me, feminism isn't a dirty word, or a derogatory label - it's something that tells the world that I am a decent human being who demands that all human beings be treated with some fucking respect. So I can shut that one down pretty quickly. I'm not ashamed of being who I am.
Of late I have also become what is known in some circles as 'an ally' - a heterosexual, cisgendered person who campaigns for gay rights. Anyone can campaign for gay rights - unfortunately, that also means that everyone can be picked on for being 'gay'.
I am definitely not LGBT. I am about as straight as they get. Which is not always a good thing, considering that 'masculinity' can sometimes be a codeword for 'reckless testosterone drunk self-destructive son of a bitch', but c'est la vie. I am also quite a feminine person, in that I dress very feminine and I like makeup and jewellery and I'm very very in touch with my femaleness and my femininity and how this has impacted on my identity and who I am as a person. So yeah, it's not my rights I'm fighting for. I can fuck whoever I want and marry whoever I want and have as many kids as I want. Other people don't have that right. That's what I'm fighting for.
But the inevitable accusation comes up - I must be gay. I must be a lesbian, or a dyke, or at the very least bi. Never mind I've spent half my life drooling over one boy or another - I've noticed a recurring theme in 'defying logic' and 'ignoring facts' when it comes to homophobes and religious extremists. If I don't deny it, I am subjected to the same kind of abuse and harassment I'm working so hard to put an end to - and it hurts. I've been bullied all my life but LGBT bullying is at a whole new level and it really does wear you down. If I do deny it, I am accused of either hiding something or being the homophobe that these people are.
If I were LGBT - if I wasn't heterosexual and cisgender - I would be out of the closet. I don't have douchebag assholes for parents. I wouldn't be ashamed of my sexuality. But I'm not. I'm not offended by something that isn't offensive - I just don't like being mislabeled and subject to the abuse that is somehow justified by something that has been forced upon me. If someone kept insisting I was Anne Hathaway I would deny it - I'd be flattered, definitely not offended, but I'm...not. Same with people insisting that I'm a lesbian. I'd be flattered, definitely not offended, but I'm...not.
This kind of systematic abuse of LGBT allies has really had a detrimental impact on the gay rights movement because it intimidates people from standing up for what they believe in - 'outing' yourself as an ally does unleash something quite scary and intimidating, but people shouldn't feel like they have to be at the receiving end of abuse to be against the said abuse. I'm proud of being straight - I'm proud of my sexuality and my gender and sexual expression. I'm proud of the fact that one day I'll be a wife and I'll have a husband and I'll have a family. This does not detract from my dedication to the gay rights movement, at all. Who I am and what I'm proud of shouldn't be used against me in a fight that I'm fighting against people who not only pick on LGBTs, but people with the guts to stand up for them.
The reason why allies are subject to abuse is because LGBTs only makes up about 3% of the population - it's a very small minority and they are very easily overwhelmed by the heterosexual norm. I think it's a very healthy thing for LGBT - especially bullied, harassed, closeted LGBT youth - to know that there are more than that 3% out there supporting them - that some very cisgendered, definitely straight people are on their side, too. But that idea freaks the shit out of the right-wing twats - that 97% of the population aren't necessarily immune from the truth. It's perceived as an attack on Mr Chauvnist and Mrs Concerned Women of America and on their normal, boring, heterosexual suburban marriages and their nonexistant sex lives and sexualities, to think that I'm straight, like them, and I am cisgendered, like them, but unlike them I was given a brain and a voice and I'm using them to support the 'gay conspiracy'. It's also very easy to accuse someone of being gay, and very easy to turn people against someone who is even suspected of being gay - after all, men who supported the suffragettes and the different waves of feminism were and still are accused of being weak and effeminate but you can't actually accuse a man of being a woman. Sexuality and sexual orientation is much more fluid than biological sex. You can accuse anyone of being gay and subject them to the subsequent bullying and humiliation. The attack on allies is an attack on LGBTs, by depriving them of the emotional support and the revolutionary muscle they need to end discrimination to end hate and crime and violence and to get equal rights.
If someone tells me that I'm an LGBT, I will say that I am not - in the same way that if someone says that I am Caucasian I will say that I am not. I am not a homophobe or a racist if I deny either of these. I am an ally. I am an ally of the LGBT rights movement. And I'm proud of that, I won't deny that, if you accuse me of that you've got it right. I'm an ally, and I'm speaking out.
Thursday, November 08, 2012
TwitterFeed!
Now Playing: Red by Taylor Swift (remembering him comes in flashbacks and echoes, tell myself it's time now, gotta let go but moving on from him is impossible when I still see it all in my head, burning red)
I now have a twitter feed!
Basically, every time I update my blog it will show on my Facebook Wall. I know it gets frustrating checking blogs to find that they haven't updated/updated three million times since your last check in, so I hope people find this app useful. The feed updates every half hour, so it should keep relatively up to date (although I have been known to go on ten minute blogging sprees)
Stay beautiful!
Lady Solitaire
I now have a twitter feed!
Basically, every time I update my blog it will show on my Facebook Wall. I know it gets frustrating checking blogs to find that they haven't updated/updated three million times since your last check in, so I hope people find this app useful. The feed updates every half hour, so it should keep relatively up to date (although I have been known to go on ten minute blogging sprees)
Stay beautiful!
Lady Solitaire
Rude.
Now Playing: This Kiss (Cover) by Alex Day ft. Carrie Hope Fletcher (Cinderella said to Snow White 'how did love get so off course?' All I wanted was a white knight with a good heart, soft touch, fast horse)
It is interesting how people respond to advice.
The English WACE exam was yesterday and, considering people bug me incessantly for advice and I like to think I know what I'm talking about when it comes to English, I spent a good amount of time on Facebook giving advice, asking questions, relaying things my teacher has said to me throughout the year. It's what all the top students for all the other subjects were doing and I've been picking at other people's brains greedily.
Most people were thankful. Lots of people messaged me asking questions and for my opinion. I helped out a lot of people. But some, just some, were very...hostile.
People confuse modesty with insecurity - it's why I've been made into the insecure little freak that I am now, because people can't bear things like pride and self-esteem. But the fact of the matter is, I am top in English. I do know what I'm talking about. Other people do benefit from my advice. You would too, if you got off your high horse. I ask lots of much smarter people for advice for other things. There's nothing wrong with that. But because of this, they also confuse pride with lack of humility. So really, the problem's not with me, it's with you. If you're offended by an open offer of advice that you can take or leave then logic and reason must really kill you. But I guess that's all part of being a little teenage shit.
The thing is, asking questions like 'who made you self-appointed expert?' reaffirms why I'm top of English. I mean, if you're going to dream up insults then at least dream up insults that are coherent. What is the point of asking who made someone a self-appointed' expert? Amateurs. And I am not a self-appointed expert. I can't give myself A grades - if I could, then why did you give yourself bare passes?
If I was bitter and hostile towards everyone who was better at me in anything I'd spend my life like you - endlessly sour, disappointed and hellbent on pushing everyone down in a misguided attempt to pull yourself up. I worked damn hard to get to where I am now, and the night before exams I let people pick at my brain. If you can't show me some respect at least show yourself some respect and don't make an arse of yourself on the cybersphere.
It is interesting how people respond to advice.
The English WACE exam was yesterday and, considering people bug me incessantly for advice and I like to think I know what I'm talking about when it comes to English, I spent a good amount of time on Facebook giving advice, asking questions, relaying things my teacher has said to me throughout the year. It's what all the top students for all the other subjects were doing and I've been picking at other people's brains greedily.
Most people were thankful. Lots of people messaged me asking questions and for my opinion. I helped out a lot of people. But some, just some, were very...hostile.
People confuse modesty with insecurity - it's why I've been made into the insecure little freak that I am now, because people can't bear things like pride and self-esteem. But the fact of the matter is, I am top in English. I do know what I'm talking about. Other people do benefit from my advice. You would too, if you got off your high horse. I ask lots of much smarter people for advice for other things. There's nothing wrong with that. But because of this, they also confuse pride with lack of humility. So really, the problem's not with me, it's with you. If you're offended by an open offer of advice that you can take or leave then logic and reason must really kill you. But I guess that's all part of being a little teenage shit.
The thing is, asking questions like 'who made you self-appointed expert?' reaffirms why I'm top of English. I mean, if you're going to dream up insults then at least dream up insults that are coherent. What is the point of asking who made someone a self-appointed' expert? Amateurs. And I am not a self-appointed expert. I can't give myself A grades - if I could, then why did you give yourself bare passes?
If I was bitter and hostile towards everyone who was better at me in anything I'd spend my life like you - endlessly sour, disappointed and hellbent on pushing everyone down in a misguided attempt to pull yourself up. I worked damn hard to get to where I am now, and the night before exams I let people pick at my brain. If you can't show me some respect at least show yourself some respect and don't make an arse of yourself on the cybersphere.
Wednesday, November 07, 2012
Never Grow Up: A Letter to Five Year Old Me
Now Playing: The Best Day by Taylor Swift (I'm five years old, it's getting cold, I've got my big coat on. I hear your laugh and look up smiling at you, I run and run. Past the pumpkin patch and the tractor rides, look how the sky is gold. I hug your legs and fall asleep on the way home)
Dearest Five,
You're finally starting school and you're super duper trooper excited. You get Fridays off and you just chill watching Hi-5 and hanging out with daddy, who takes you to the zoo and the aquarium about a million times this year but you never ever get bored of it. You've started having a serious dress obsession which you haven't quite shaken off yet. Seriously. Eleven years later and your wardrobe is still about 99% dresses.
On the topic of school, dearest Five, pre-primary has a two hour lunch break, and yet you still can't manage to finish half a sandwich. Work on that, dearest Five, because soon you'll have to perfect the art of eating breakfast whilst running for the bus.
Your best friend is a jerk. I hate to break it, but I have no idea how a five year old could be such a jerk. Silly, selfish, childish, pedantic, insufferably annoying, yes, but proper full blown teenage jerkiness? Only you would manage to find someone so horrible; you seem to have a thing for jerks. You put your little hand over his and taught him how to write his 's's properly when all the teachers tried and failed. He's got brown curly hair and chocolate coloured doe eyes and an adorable cherubic face and you think he looks like Prince Charming. You have a massive fight and don't speak to each other ever again and it breaks your little heart. And then you get over it. You have a three second rebound rate. I wish I still had that.
Dearest Five, you've started to learn to play the piano and you love it, even though your six second attention span makes the mammoth task of five minutes of practice a day slightly problematic. Don't ever stop dancing and singing and making music and smiles. You can finally write now, although for some inexplicable reason you write backwards like Leonardo da Vinci. I can't do that now if I tried, but I guess you've always been special. Also, you've written in the Pre Primary graduation book that you want to be a gardener. WTF?
Dearest Five, I wish I could have prepared you for your hospital trip. It was very sudden and scary and I wish someone could have told you, but it was an emergency and no one could. It never really occurred to you that you're different and because of that you'd have to go through so much. You were so little and bubbly and innocent and that hospital stay took some of that away from you, changed you a little bit, and it still makes me cry. You were scared and confused and lonely and everything hurt. The pain was bewildering and mind blowing but the fear...the fear was unspeakable. But don't cry, dearest Five. It makes Mummy sad.
Dearest Five, this year was tough. But it was also beautiful, magical, and filled your little baby eyes with awe. You've got a new scar to add to your collection, but don't let it get you down - it's a battle scar, baby. Every day I see it and I remember how brave you were back then, scared and alone but still trying to be yourself, still smiling and chattering away to the nurses and trying to make Mummy laugh. Never be ashamed of your scars, dearest Five. They're badges of honour.
Love,
Nearly Seventeen.
Dearest Five,
You're finally starting school and you're super duper trooper excited. You get Fridays off and you just chill watching Hi-5 and hanging out with daddy, who takes you to the zoo and the aquarium about a million times this year but you never ever get bored of it. You've started having a serious dress obsession which you haven't quite shaken off yet. Seriously. Eleven years later and your wardrobe is still about 99% dresses.
On the topic of school, dearest Five, pre-primary has a two hour lunch break, and yet you still can't manage to finish half a sandwich. Work on that, dearest Five, because soon you'll have to perfect the art of eating breakfast whilst running for the bus.
Your best friend is a jerk. I hate to break it, but I have no idea how a five year old could be such a jerk. Silly, selfish, childish, pedantic, insufferably annoying, yes, but proper full blown teenage jerkiness? Only you would manage to find someone so horrible; you seem to have a thing for jerks. You put your little hand over his and taught him how to write his 's's properly when all the teachers tried and failed. He's got brown curly hair and chocolate coloured doe eyes and an adorable cherubic face and you think he looks like Prince Charming. You have a massive fight and don't speak to each other ever again and it breaks your little heart. And then you get over it. You have a three second rebound rate. I wish I still had that.
Dearest Five, you've started to learn to play the piano and you love it, even though your six second attention span makes the mammoth task of five minutes of practice a day slightly problematic. Don't ever stop dancing and singing and making music and smiles. You can finally write now, although for some inexplicable reason you write backwards like Leonardo da Vinci. I can't do that now if I tried, but I guess you've always been special. Also, you've written in the Pre Primary graduation book that you want to be a gardener. WTF?
Dearest Five, I wish I could have prepared you for your hospital trip. It was very sudden and scary and I wish someone could have told you, but it was an emergency and no one could. It never really occurred to you that you're different and because of that you'd have to go through so much. You were so little and bubbly and innocent and that hospital stay took some of that away from you, changed you a little bit, and it still makes me cry. You were scared and confused and lonely and everything hurt. The pain was bewildering and mind blowing but the fear...the fear was unspeakable. But don't cry, dearest Five. It makes Mummy sad.
Dearest Five, this year was tough. But it was also beautiful, magical, and filled your little baby eyes with awe. You've got a new scar to add to your collection, but don't let it get you down - it's a battle scar, baby. Every day I see it and I remember how brave you were back then, scared and alone but still trying to be yourself, still smiling and chattering away to the nurses and trying to make Mummy laugh. Never be ashamed of your scars, dearest Five. They're badges of honour.
Love,
Nearly Seventeen.
Tuesday, November 06, 2012
Never Grow Up: A Letter to Four Year Old Me
Now Playing: Never Grow Up by Taylor Swift (your little hand's wrapped around my finger and it's so quiet in the world tonight)
Dearest Four,
I really wish you'd stop chucking tantrums every time your sister goes to school (which is EVERY DAY, so that's a LOT OF TANTRUMS) and you don't. It's really. Not. That. Great. I would know.
Other than that, at four, you're sweet, and life's sweet. You still eat more nutella than is humanly possible. At four you're much like you are at sixteen, actually, only without the PMS and the inexplicable attraction to inexplicable boys. Your biggest complaint in life is that Daddy's car smells funny, so methinks you've got it pretty good. You're over your harry highpants stage and everything is pretty and frilly and flowery - you wear white stockings with pink flowers on them and socks with scratchy lace trim like a spinster grandmother. And you've got a big thing for denim, too, and I'm not quite sure why. You go batshit over anything Hello Kitty and anything purple makes you hyperventilate with excitement because it's your FAVOURITE COLOUR OF ALL TIME. You're fluent in Korean but you lose it pretty fast once 할아버지 leaves. When you're sixteen you'll be itching to relearn it, and not just because you're trying to trick foreign relatives into getting you things you can't reach.
Dearest Four, you're going to Singapore and you're going to turn five there and you're super duper trooper excited. You think it's the first time but you've actually been there a million times since you were a teeny tiny baby (actually, you're still pretty teeny tiny - are you 3' yet?). You stood by the window in Grandma's apartment in your nightgown and wet hair in the middle of the night, just staring and wondering how the world got so big. It gets bigger, dearest Four. And scarier. But much, much more beautiful.
I love your big elephant ears. I love how your favourite words are 'why' and 'what' and 'how', not 'don't care'. I love your big gummy grin and the cheeky glint in your eyes. Things get scary from here on in, dearest Four. I wish I could prepare you but there's no way to tell a four year old how to deal with hospital and pain and disorientation and scars. But you pull through, dearest Four, you always do. 'Giving up' and 'can't do this' don't exist in your gung-ho vocabulary. You're a daydreamer and a chatterbox, dearest Four, and hold on to that. It's what makes you strong, stronger than I am.
Love,
Nearly Seventeen
Dearest Four,
I really wish you'd stop chucking tantrums every time your sister goes to school (which is EVERY DAY, so that's a LOT OF TANTRUMS) and you don't. It's really. Not. That. Great. I would know.
Other than that, at four, you're sweet, and life's sweet. You still eat more nutella than is humanly possible. At four you're much like you are at sixteen, actually, only without the PMS and the inexplicable attraction to inexplicable boys. Your biggest complaint in life is that Daddy's car smells funny, so methinks you've got it pretty good. You're over your harry highpants stage and everything is pretty and frilly and flowery - you wear white stockings with pink flowers on them and socks with scratchy lace trim like a spinster grandmother. And you've got a big thing for denim, too, and I'm not quite sure why. You go batshit over anything Hello Kitty and anything purple makes you hyperventilate with excitement because it's your FAVOURITE COLOUR OF ALL TIME. You're fluent in Korean but you lose it pretty fast once 할아버지 leaves. When you're sixteen you'll be itching to relearn it, and not just because you're trying to trick foreign relatives into getting you things you can't reach.
Dearest Four, you're going to Singapore and you're going to turn five there and you're super duper trooper excited. You think it's the first time but you've actually been there a million times since you were a teeny tiny baby (actually, you're still pretty teeny tiny - are you 3' yet?). You stood by the window in Grandma's apartment in your nightgown and wet hair in the middle of the night, just staring and wondering how the world got so big. It gets bigger, dearest Four. And scarier. But much, much more beautiful.
I love your big elephant ears. I love how your favourite words are 'why' and 'what' and 'how', not 'don't care'. I love your big gummy grin and the cheeky glint in your eyes. Things get scary from here on in, dearest Four. I wish I could prepare you but there's no way to tell a four year old how to deal with hospital and pain and disorientation and scars. But you pull through, dearest Four, you always do. 'Giving up' and 'can't do this' don't exist in your gung-ho vocabulary. You're a daydreamer and a chatterbox, dearest Four, and hold on to that. It's what makes you strong, stronger than I am.
Love,
Nearly Seventeen
Baby Me
Now Playing: Never Grow Up by Taylor Swift (I won't let nobody hurt you, won't let no one break your heart)
I'm halfway through writing a letter to my four year old self (as you do) when I realize that, weirdly, I don't remember it as vividly as I remember being three. So I was flipping through a few family albums trying to find some photos to jog my memory and I didn't find any at four, per se...maybe cameras were banned in 1999...
What I did find was a few pictures of me, as a baby, but it looked...odd. You know when you look at yourself as a baby and you're like 'oh, cute!' but not 'oh, me!'? I get that in a big way. I think it's also part of being a teenager...you know, when high school and boys and puberty are such a huge part of your life you can't really remember more innocent times when you bawled the house down over a poopy diaper and not an asshole problem of a different kind. And, of course, the mandatory claim that I must make every day to adults that 'no, of course I do not want a baby yet' so that I don't get accused of being a slut/a feminist/pregnant (I'm starting to think that 'wanting a baby' and 'normal teenage sexual desire' kind of go hand in hand and it's ridiculous to deny the goo goo eyes you get every time you get to cuddle a child). But for me, that squirmy smiley baby is not me, and for a long time I couldn't figure out why.
I've figured out why.
My sister was born in 1994. We have a bajillion pictures of my sister being spoilt rotten by my first time over the moon parents over two glorious years - 1994 and 1995. Actually, on that topic, my sister was actually the joker when we were little - she was the one who had a million different hilarious facial expressions and she was the funny, silly baby - looking at my baby photos I wasn't nearly so entertaining. But anyway, once I entered the scene in 1996 there are very few pictures of my sister alone - she's always with me, cuddling me, an arm wrapped around me...in more than one photo screaming loudly at me...and then there are a whole slew of pictures of my parents, alone, with my sister in Melbourne.
Where was I? Oh, I was in hospital.
I know that my condition is not that serious in the grand scheme of things. But it was serious enough to be shipped off to Melbourne so that specialists could deal with my fucked up heart. And to everyone who has ever bullied me for crying, for having to haul myself up flights of stairs, for inching my way down things, for being slow and tired...I wish I could show them this.
It's June 1996, in Melbourne. I am three months old and sedated. My cot in the ICU looks exactly like a cage - gunmetal bars, the whole thing. My hand is strapped to a pillow that's pinned to the edge of the cot so that I can't wriggle out of my IV drip. There's a tube taped across my face into my nose, and a blue pipe snaking around me. There's a clear plastic box around my head, with a hole for my neck, and my tiny baby head looks disembodied in a very sickening way. Everything looks weird and foreign and medical and even though looking at it I know this is a snapshot of people saving my life but it does look like some sick twisted medical experiment. I don't like to think of it as me.
Immediately after this there is a picture that should make me feel better but doesn't. I look much bigger than the small, frail, sickly baby in hospital and I have a big toothless grin from ear to ear. I'm in my own cot surrounded by my own toys. I'm wearing the biggest nappy in the history of the earth but my jacket is unbuttoned and I can see it, that ugly scar that I've gotten used to on my own imperfect sixteen year old body but so out of place on a baby.
I see this scar every day. I've seen it on my roly poly three year old body, I remember it on my scrawny little seven year old body, and it was there every day as my body changed into what it is now. I can't imagine what my body would look like without it - I forget sometimes that other people don't have one, too. Now it's relatively unintimidating - just a white, thin, clean line that doesn't hurt at all - it's actually quite numb - and a small white dimple. When I was younger I had no problem pulling my shirt up to show people, and now I don't mind pulling at the neckline of my shirt a little to show an inch or two.
So I don't know why these baby pictures are disturbing me so much. It's the cognitive dissonance between the purity and innocence of being a baby and the humiliation, disorientation and pain of hospital and scars. I'm just so uncomfortable with the idea of a baby feeling this pain, with having these scars. I remember at five, even at fourteen, being lost and confused and humiliated by the hospital, even though I go there a hell of a lot more than most other people. Because I consider my younger self to be such a radically different person to who I am now - hence the reason why I can write totally third person letters to myself - I can't see it as me going through it. I see it as a baby going through it.
On the last day of school we did the old school tradition of climbing up to the top of the hundred year old building and ringing a bell on the roof, which involved going to places normally kept under lock and key and tramping up and down staircases not designed for daily use. On the way down from ringing the bell I had to bend in a way that made my pacemaker dig in uncomfortably, and so I was taking it slowly - compounded my intense dislike of stairs as a result of a childhood accident. I wasn't going momunetally slowly and the other people weren't going much faster, but a girl waiting at the foot of the stairs suddenly started hauling abuse at me as I awkwardly tripped down the stairs in an effort to speed up. As a result of that, I had a moment of the most intense pain before I was pushed away by other people who also thought it would be a good idea to bully me for taking a microsecond too long on the stair case.
It wasn't a very nice way to end high school, but it was a very typical way to end high school - constantly bullied for things out of my control. I don't like being slow and I don't like being in pain and I don't like being yelled at by my own classmates. But looking at my scarred baby self I just want to remember, somehow, to tell myself that it's not my fault. It's not my fault I had to go through that, it's not my fault that I'm slow or in pain, and it's not my fault if I get yelled at.
Dear child of the future, I love you already. Throw as many tantrums as you want. Drive me up the wall. I don't care. Just please, please, please don't put me through what I put my mother through. Be safe, be healthy. Please.
I'm halfway through writing a letter to my four year old self (as you do) when I realize that, weirdly, I don't remember it as vividly as I remember being three. So I was flipping through a few family albums trying to find some photos to jog my memory and I didn't find any at four, per se...maybe cameras were banned in 1999...
What I did find was a few pictures of me, as a baby, but it looked...odd. You know when you look at yourself as a baby and you're like 'oh, cute!' but not 'oh, me!'? I get that in a big way. I think it's also part of being a teenager...you know, when high school and boys and puberty are such a huge part of your life you can't really remember more innocent times when you bawled the house down over a poopy diaper and not an asshole problem of a different kind. And, of course, the mandatory claim that I must make every day to adults that 'no, of course I do not want a baby yet' so that I don't get accused of being a slut/a feminist/pregnant (I'm starting to think that 'wanting a baby' and 'normal teenage sexual desire' kind of go hand in hand and it's ridiculous to deny the goo goo eyes you get every time you get to cuddle a child). But for me, that squirmy smiley baby is not me, and for a long time I couldn't figure out why.
I've figured out why.
My sister was born in 1994. We have a bajillion pictures of my sister being spoilt rotten by my first time over the moon parents over two glorious years - 1994 and 1995. Actually, on that topic, my sister was actually the joker when we were little - she was the one who had a million different hilarious facial expressions and she was the funny, silly baby - looking at my baby photos I wasn't nearly so entertaining. But anyway, once I entered the scene in 1996 there are very few pictures of my sister alone - she's always with me, cuddling me, an arm wrapped around me...in more than one photo screaming loudly at me...and then there are a whole slew of pictures of my parents, alone, with my sister in Melbourne.
Where was I? Oh, I was in hospital.
I know that my condition is not that serious in the grand scheme of things. But it was serious enough to be shipped off to Melbourne so that specialists could deal with my fucked up heart. And to everyone who has ever bullied me for crying, for having to haul myself up flights of stairs, for inching my way down things, for being slow and tired...I wish I could show them this.
It's June 1996, in Melbourne. I am three months old and sedated. My cot in the ICU looks exactly like a cage - gunmetal bars, the whole thing. My hand is strapped to a pillow that's pinned to the edge of the cot so that I can't wriggle out of my IV drip. There's a tube taped across my face into my nose, and a blue pipe snaking around me. There's a clear plastic box around my head, with a hole for my neck, and my tiny baby head looks disembodied in a very sickening way. Everything looks weird and foreign and medical and even though looking at it I know this is a snapshot of people saving my life but it does look like some sick twisted medical experiment. I don't like to think of it as me.
Immediately after this there is a picture that should make me feel better but doesn't. I look much bigger than the small, frail, sickly baby in hospital and I have a big toothless grin from ear to ear. I'm in my own cot surrounded by my own toys. I'm wearing the biggest nappy in the history of the earth but my jacket is unbuttoned and I can see it, that ugly scar that I've gotten used to on my own imperfect sixteen year old body but so out of place on a baby.
I see this scar every day. I've seen it on my roly poly three year old body, I remember it on my scrawny little seven year old body, and it was there every day as my body changed into what it is now. I can't imagine what my body would look like without it - I forget sometimes that other people don't have one, too. Now it's relatively unintimidating - just a white, thin, clean line that doesn't hurt at all - it's actually quite numb - and a small white dimple. When I was younger I had no problem pulling my shirt up to show people, and now I don't mind pulling at the neckline of my shirt a little to show an inch or two.
So I don't know why these baby pictures are disturbing me so much. It's the cognitive dissonance between the purity and innocence of being a baby and the humiliation, disorientation and pain of hospital and scars. I'm just so uncomfortable with the idea of a baby feeling this pain, with having these scars. I remember at five, even at fourteen, being lost and confused and humiliated by the hospital, even though I go there a hell of a lot more than most other people. Because I consider my younger self to be such a radically different person to who I am now - hence the reason why I can write totally third person letters to myself - I can't see it as me going through it. I see it as a baby going through it.
On the last day of school we did the old school tradition of climbing up to the top of the hundred year old building and ringing a bell on the roof, which involved going to places normally kept under lock and key and tramping up and down staircases not designed for daily use. On the way down from ringing the bell I had to bend in a way that made my pacemaker dig in uncomfortably, and so I was taking it slowly - compounded my intense dislike of stairs as a result of a childhood accident. I wasn't going momunetally slowly and the other people weren't going much faster, but a girl waiting at the foot of the stairs suddenly started hauling abuse at me as I awkwardly tripped down the stairs in an effort to speed up. As a result of that, I had a moment of the most intense pain before I was pushed away by other people who also thought it would be a good idea to bully me for taking a microsecond too long on the stair case.
It wasn't a very nice way to end high school, but it was a very typical way to end high school - constantly bullied for things out of my control. I don't like being slow and I don't like being in pain and I don't like being yelled at by my own classmates. But looking at my scarred baby self I just want to remember, somehow, to tell myself that it's not my fault. It's not my fault I had to go through that, it's not my fault that I'm slow or in pain, and it's not my fault if I get yelled at.
Dear child of the future, I love you already. Throw as many tantrums as you want. Drive me up the wall. I don't care. Just please, please, please don't put me through what I put my mother through. Be safe, be healthy. Please.
Monday, November 05, 2012
Never Grow Up: A Letter to Three Year Old Me
Now Playing: The Best Day by Taylor Swift (there is a video I found from back when I was three, you set up a paint set in the kitchen and you're talking to me, it's the age of princesses and pirate ships and the seven dwarves, Daddy's smart and you're the prettiest lady in the whole wide world)
Dearest Three,
Life's amazing, when you're three, and you know it. I miss you. I miss your six second attention span. I miss sitting in the booster seat at the back of the car musing about how a hundred dollar note would solve all your problems. You were the hoop champion back before those mean doctors cut you up and it hurt to have a piece of plastic swinging around your waist. You're absolutely terrified of Simba who's twice your weight and nearly made you drown, but he's warm and snugly and gives cuddly hugs and slurpy kisses (you get a replacement for that in about thirteen years time, don't worry). Your hair is a cross between a firework and a train wreck and it's oh so cute.
Dearest Three, don't worry about what other people say. I know Mummy has a terrible dress sense but I promise no-one will hold it against you that you used to wear cartoon shirts tucked into harry high pants and you're so short that an untucked hand me down shirt looks like a ballgown. And don't worry what other people say about your Bananas in Pyjamas tracksuit or your Buzz Lightyear toys. Girls can do anything boys can do. I love how your best friend is a boy and I love how that hasn't changed. I love that you don't know your numbers from one to ten but you can memorize the lyrics to all your favourite songs. Which are pretty shit, to be honest, dearest Three. The Wheels on the Bus is not as avant-garde as you think.
I love how you could have read this and understood every word, Three. You're reading Harry Potter now and you love it, and you wanna grow up and be a writer someday. You will. I'm not there yet, but you will be. No matter that you can't write anything legible yet. You will soon.
But what I love most about you, Three, is you're the best dreamer I know. Now I'm tired and cynical and old but you're a little fire engine when you want something - loud, bold and always in a hurry. I love your guts and I wish I still had them - I love how you were always the first to bounce up to go on stage to sing, dance, or just try out being a stand up comedian.
Keep having the time of your life, Three. Things get tough, but keep on believing that life is beautiful. Enjoy your nutella sandwich. I still don't understand why you like it so much, or why it takes you three hours to eat anything.
Love,
Nearly Seventeen.
Dearest Three,
Life's amazing, when you're three, and you know it. I miss you. I miss your six second attention span. I miss sitting in the booster seat at the back of the car musing about how a hundred dollar note would solve all your problems. You were the hoop champion back before those mean doctors cut you up and it hurt to have a piece of plastic swinging around your waist. You're absolutely terrified of Simba who's twice your weight and nearly made you drown, but he's warm and snugly and gives cuddly hugs and slurpy kisses (you get a replacement for that in about thirteen years time, don't worry). Your hair is a cross between a firework and a train wreck and it's oh so cute.
Dearest Three, don't worry about what other people say. I know Mummy has a terrible dress sense but I promise no-one will hold it against you that you used to wear cartoon shirts tucked into harry high pants and you're so short that an untucked hand me down shirt looks like a ballgown. And don't worry what other people say about your Bananas in Pyjamas tracksuit or your Buzz Lightyear toys. Girls can do anything boys can do. I love how your best friend is a boy and I love how that hasn't changed. I love that you don't know your numbers from one to ten but you can memorize the lyrics to all your favourite songs. Which are pretty shit, to be honest, dearest Three. The Wheels on the Bus is not as avant-garde as you think.
I love how you could have read this and understood every word, Three. You're reading Harry Potter now and you love it, and you wanna grow up and be a writer someday. You will. I'm not there yet, but you will be. No matter that you can't write anything legible yet. You will soon.
But what I love most about you, Three, is you're the best dreamer I know. Now I'm tired and cynical and old but you're a little fire engine when you want something - loud, bold and always in a hurry. I love your guts and I wish I still had them - I love how you were always the first to bounce up to go on stage to sing, dance, or just try out being a stand up comedian.
Keep having the time of your life, Three. Things get tough, but keep on believing that life is beautiful. Enjoy your nutella sandwich. I still don't understand why you like it so much, or why it takes you three hours to eat anything.
Love,
Nearly Seventeen.
The Aura
Now Playing: Long Live by Taylor Swift (long live the walls we crashed through, all the kingdom lights shined just for me and you)
Religious people have what I call 'The Aura'. They can attack science, they can attack reason, they can attack logic and compassion and human rights, but don't you dare attack an ancient text that is basically a recount of the sexism, racism and oppression of civilizations long gone.
I haven't read any religious text cover to cover. But I have read parts of the Bible - Old and New Testament - and the Koran. They're violent, oppressive texts. And yet they have 'The Aura' that science and logic don't have. Religious people can defend and are defended by these books and the consequence of this is more violence.
In response to Christian kids saying that they 'can't' support marriage equality and they 'must' be homophobic because 'the Bible says that homosexuality is a sin', Dan Savage fought back at the book that has been the cause of so much LGBT bullying, inequality and suicide. He said that we have to ignore the bullshit in the Bible. Not that the Bible itself was bullshit, but that there was bullshit in it. In the same way that Australia is not bullshit, but there's a helluva lot of bullshit in Australia. People who couldn't make this distinction walked out.
Because the truth is, whether you're Christian or not, that the Bible got a lot of stuff wrong. The Bible is a pro-slavery text - as Will Anderson said in one of his routines 'it says in the Bible that you can have a slave from a neighbouring island. Does New Zealand count?'. Now, nobody can a) have a slave or b) support slavery and c) call themselves a Christian and/or a sane person. The people I know who are Christian who don't support gay rights definitely don't support slavery, but they can't see that it's the same thing - it's a moral dilemma that the Bible got wrong. It doesn't make you any less of a Christian to just skip over the bits that you know to be wrong - would you be a better Christian if you decided to enslave a New Zealander? No. The Bible got something as simple as slavery wrong. What are the odds that it got something as complicated as sexuality wrong?
As an atheist I don't just see the Bible as a holy text. I see the Bible as a book that contains many wonderful stories and many very good moral lessons. I also see the Bible as a time capsule - it encapsulates the social mores and conventions of a time and place I know to have been very racist, sexist, violent, ignorant and xenophobic. In a time before science and knowledge perhaps these attitudes and beliefs could have been excused, but they cannot, not now. The Christians who do support gay rights recognise the great value of a book such as the Bible in teaching morals and values. They see the value of having religion in their lives. But they also see that there is a difference between adhering to the Bible and adhering to the most outdated and absurd societal conventions that are totally out of time and place. They see that there's nothing Christian about homophobia, about corrective rape, about bullying LGBT youths into suicide, about denying LGBT people basic human rights or punishing them for what is normal, natural and inevitable.
People don't understand how many people have died because of this book. The Bible is being used against LGBT people in the same way that it was used against Muslims in the Crusades. But it is the most unfair fight imaginable because we're not even allowed to say how wrong the Bible is about so many things because that's 'offensive' - do you know what's offensive? Being told that you're going to hell/that you're immoral/that you're a sinner/that you're not worthy of respect or human rights/that you deserve to be bullied' simply because of what your genitals look like in comparison to those of your partner. It makes no sense.
We don't live the same way we did thousands of years ago - and thank God for that. We don't believe that women who engage in premarital sex should be stoned to death - which is in the Bible. We don't believe that eating shellfish or wearing polyester is a sin - which is in the Bible. There are a lot of things in the Bible people already ignore - and for good reason. The Bible was written in a time when we knew virtually nothing - about ourselves and the planet we live on. The Bible didn't get everything right. Sexuality is one of them, but it's the only thing that we continue to quote the Bible word for word, literally.
So you know what? Stop being offended. Stop being offended by the truth. And stop hiding behind a book to excuse your prejudices. I cannot believe that Rick Santorum is justified in saying that homosexuality and bestiality are essentially the same thing but Dan Savage can't even say that the Bible got something wrong and it's hurting people. The reason? Rick's got The Aura - The Aura that anyone who isn't white, male, heterosexual and Christian have to live without.
Religious people have what I call 'The Aura'. They can attack science, they can attack reason, they can attack logic and compassion and human rights, but don't you dare attack an ancient text that is basically a recount of the sexism, racism and oppression of civilizations long gone.
I haven't read any religious text cover to cover. But I have read parts of the Bible - Old and New Testament - and the Koran. They're violent, oppressive texts. And yet they have 'The Aura' that science and logic don't have. Religious people can defend and are defended by these books and the consequence of this is more violence.
In response to Christian kids saying that they 'can't' support marriage equality and they 'must' be homophobic because 'the Bible says that homosexuality is a sin', Dan Savage fought back at the book that has been the cause of so much LGBT bullying, inequality and suicide. He said that we have to ignore the bullshit in the Bible. Not that the Bible itself was bullshit, but that there was bullshit in it. In the same way that Australia is not bullshit, but there's a helluva lot of bullshit in Australia. People who couldn't make this distinction walked out.
Because the truth is, whether you're Christian or not, that the Bible got a lot of stuff wrong. The Bible is a pro-slavery text - as Will Anderson said in one of his routines 'it says in the Bible that you can have a slave from a neighbouring island. Does New Zealand count?'. Now, nobody can a) have a slave or b) support slavery and c) call themselves a Christian and/or a sane person. The people I know who are Christian who don't support gay rights definitely don't support slavery, but they can't see that it's the same thing - it's a moral dilemma that the Bible got wrong. It doesn't make you any less of a Christian to just skip over the bits that you know to be wrong - would you be a better Christian if you decided to enslave a New Zealander? No. The Bible got something as simple as slavery wrong. What are the odds that it got something as complicated as sexuality wrong?
As an atheist I don't just see the Bible as a holy text. I see the Bible as a book that contains many wonderful stories and many very good moral lessons. I also see the Bible as a time capsule - it encapsulates the social mores and conventions of a time and place I know to have been very racist, sexist, violent, ignorant and xenophobic. In a time before science and knowledge perhaps these attitudes and beliefs could have been excused, but they cannot, not now. The Christians who do support gay rights recognise the great value of a book such as the Bible in teaching morals and values. They see the value of having religion in their lives. But they also see that there is a difference between adhering to the Bible and adhering to the most outdated and absurd societal conventions that are totally out of time and place. They see that there's nothing Christian about homophobia, about corrective rape, about bullying LGBT youths into suicide, about denying LGBT people basic human rights or punishing them for what is normal, natural and inevitable.
People don't understand how many people have died because of this book. The Bible is being used against LGBT people in the same way that it was used against Muslims in the Crusades. But it is the most unfair fight imaginable because we're not even allowed to say how wrong the Bible is about so many things because that's 'offensive' - do you know what's offensive? Being told that you're going to hell/that you're immoral/that you're a sinner/that you're not worthy of respect or human rights/that you deserve to be bullied' simply because of what your genitals look like in comparison to those of your partner. It makes no sense.
We don't live the same way we did thousands of years ago - and thank God for that. We don't believe that women who engage in premarital sex should be stoned to death - which is in the Bible. We don't believe that eating shellfish or wearing polyester is a sin - which is in the Bible. There are a lot of things in the Bible people already ignore - and for good reason. The Bible was written in a time when we knew virtually nothing - about ourselves and the planet we live on. The Bible didn't get everything right. Sexuality is one of them, but it's the only thing that we continue to quote the Bible word for word, literally.
So you know what? Stop being offended. Stop being offended by the truth. And stop hiding behind a book to excuse your prejudices. I cannot believe that Rick Santorum is justified in saying that homosexuality and bestiality are essentially the same thing but Dan Savage can't even say that the Bible got something wrong and it's hurting people. The reason? Rick's got The Aura - The Aura that anyone who isn't white, male, heterosexual and Christian have to live without.
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