A Queer Life

"Three," we said unanimously about the crazy looking woman walking in the library door.  "And the only reason she gets such a high score is because she is so interesting," Jaime elaborated.  We had been rating people at work for several weeks now; it passed the time and gave us a few laughs. But one day we looked at each other. "We never rate ourselves," I said.  "I'm too scared," he said.  "Yeah." "And really it depends on the day," he added. "Yeah." I looked down, afraid to meet his eye. I didn't want his harsh eye judging me. I didn't even want to judge myself. "Some days I might be as low as a four and others I might be a ten. Depending on how my eyebrows look. Or how skinny I feel. And doesn't personality have a lot to do with attraction?" "Yeah." "A person can increase their score by three or four points just by putting a little effort into their look, having a little co...

Sometimes I feel deep shame about the amount of time I spend on YouTube, watching pointless shit and reading comments. I feel like I'm looking for something and I'm disappointed. Obviously some YouTubers and their videos are more fulfilling than others and sometimes I feel like watching a video is worthwhile. I will sit and watch a two hour video just staring at someone's face with rapt attention. I will regularly pause to read comments, to see if anyone has anything to add to the discourse. I have spent hours and hours and hours of my day doing this. Then I feel shame when I look up from my phone to see the house messy and my mind hazy and the kids hungry and I don't know what month it is.  I like watching creators who have interesting things to say, new points of view, or just funny points of view on anything. I find a channel and I think: "This is the one. This is my favorite YouTuber from now until the end of time." I have even contributed to the occasiona...

I'm back so soon. Blogging has been on the back burner of my mind, and the smell is finally getting to me.  Most of my life I have avoided having a voice. Some people call that being shy. I am shy, but I don't know if avoiding my own humanness and the space I take up, is part of that. But blogging is definitely a way to express myself in a way that is comfortable to me. Dare I even announce that I am considering doing a 30 day challenge to blog every day? I worry that once I announce it, I will run away and stop blogging for two years, or just abandon this blog and start another one where no one can find me. (I'm always doing that. I don't even remember all the random blogs I've started. But, like I said, I run when I know I'm being read. I run when I hear my own voice being echoed back to me through my audience. Making a difference terrifies me. Affecting people terrifies me. Hurting anyone terrifies me. I live in terror. I live in terror. But that's not wh...

A millenia ago, there was a TV show called American Idol. I used to watch this show.  All those lifetimes ago, I was also Mormon and subscribed to all those Mormon beliefs; one of which was telling teenaged girls: "When you dress immodestly, you become pornography for men." I was also married to a man who many would describe as "downright abusive"; but he never hit me, so it took me a minute to figure out. Don't worry, I'll connect all these dots in a minute. It was the day after some high profile awards show and the Internet talk was about Jennifer Lopez's nip-slip the night before. I dug deeper trying to figure out what happened. Had her boob just popped out of her dress while presenting? Did she act embarrassed? How did the audience respond? I had trouble finding much except a few benign pictures of her presenting. There was speculation about whether her exposure was on purpose or not. Eventually I found a video of her whole time on stage. It was only...

It was 2012. I sat on a grassy knoll talking to a friend during a church activity. It was May, the weather was lovely. The details of that moment are still vivid fourteen years later. I remember my white pants and the freckles on my friend's nose.  "It is May," I said.  "Yeah," she closed her eyes under the sunshine with a smile. "It's nice." "In January I saw a flyer for an event in March," I said. "I remember at the time thinking: March is so far away, it will never come. But it will. It did. And now it's May." "Time is like that," she said, blinking and squinting to find her kids. Once satisfied, she leaned back on her elbows in the grass. "There was a day when 2012 seemed like a fantasy. Now it is here. And there will be a day when 2012 is a distant memory and it will only become more distant." "Hmmm." "Time just keeps going. Teasing us and stomping on us and soothing us all at once....

I am blogging (in case you haven't noticed) and I have lots of mixed feelings about this. Feeling number one is the topic of the day. Posting a blog on the internet...public...World Wide Web...with global accessibility. Why would someone do that? To be read. Because you have something to say. Attention for your ideas or yourself but attention is the ultimate and only reason.  I feel shame around any attention seeking no matter how subtle, this shame applies to myself and others. Whenever I watch YouTube and vloggers start clamoring for attention, I feel revulsion at the hunger of it.  I could just let people do their own thing, to each his own, que sera sera and all that. Just because they have different needs than mine doesn't make them bad or wrong; logically I know this, but logic isn't part of this equation. I feel disgusted and I feel cruel for my disgust. My abject distain for attention seekers is probably a dysfunction on my part. I assume it is normal and human to w...