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Friday, December 14, 2012

Rose Petals

(This is a post I started writing a little over a month ago and never finished. I finally got around to writing more of it and I thought I would share it with you)

Friday afternoon.
Had a hard time. Felt like crap, and all empty inside.
So I went for a walk.

As I was walking, I started thinking. But they weren't happy thoughts. It was like, having a voice inside my head, that I know doesn't belong to me, whispering all my insecurities in my ear.

Worthless. Stupid. Ugly. Fat. A failure. Useless. Shit artist. You should just die.

It's hard to ignore yourself.
I angrily snatched a rose from off its bush, and kept walking.

But I heard music. Somebody was practicing. It wasn't piano, or guitar, or any other western instrument. It was a huge, Chinese stringed instrument. (I looked it up, its called a guzheng.)

The musician wasn't old, as I had expected. As I walked past her house, where she was playing in her garage, I saw that she was a teenager. No older than I. And that seemed to make her playing sound even more beautiful.

I wanted to listen more, but I didn't want to seem creepy and stand in the driveway, so I sort of stood behind a hedge. yes, I do know that's still pretty creepy.

I stared at the rose. It was beautiful. It was the colors of a sunset, red at the base that faded into yellow.

You'll never be that beautiful, whispered the little voice. "I'm not ugly..." I whispered and tossed a rose petal to the ground. The voice stayed silent. I tried again.
"I'm not stupid." Still nothing. I threw down another petal.

It made me feel stronger.

I kept going, throwing down the petals, and contradicting my previous statements, until I had changed them all. I felt bold. I tossed a petal in front of me and quietly whispered "I'm beautiful. I'm smart. I'm talented. I have a purpose."

I threw the rest of the rose to the ground and ran all the way to the coffee shop without looking back.

Thursday, December 13, 2012

I'd like you all to meet someone

As you may have noticed I mentioned really briefly in my last post, I have a boyfriend! I would like to introduce you to The Terrorist. He picked it, okay? He plays a lot of Counter-strike...
I was going to draw a picture of him but it wasn't good.


Nice things:

He's really sweet

He likes cuddling

He has gorgeous eyes

He's funny

He wears cool t-shirts

He's an awesome kisser

He sometimes wears glasses, but he usually wears contacts

He makes me smile even when I'm just thinking about him

He likes playing videogames and doesn't mind that I'm bad at them

He likes a lot of the same stuff as I do

He understands how forgetful I am, and always knows when I can't find my phone

He's absolutely wondertastic


Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Soapbox: Feminist Equality Colors Rant

Today in french class we were playing Hangman. Hangman is difficult in french, because every word basically ends with "e."
That is not what this rant is about.

If you didn't already know this, my French class is an online one, so the students comunicate mostly via chat box and microphone, and our teacher has a webcam. It's pretty cool.

One of the students, Monique I believe, (This is her "French class name." We all have one basically. Mine is Déesse.) was picking the word, so she got to use the whiteboard application thing to do it.

She drew the little hangman thing, and seven letter places. The first person guessed a letter, and she filled in a letter space in a different color. Then from the chat box  one of the boys said "Woah those are girly colors."
She was doing it in purple and teal.

It's not that I have a problem with being girly. Often people think feminists are man hating tomboys in pantsuits and tight buns. We aren't. I'm a multicolored haired, long skirt wearing, teenager with an awesome boyfriend. I only have a problem that he was using girly to describe colors.

People don't seem to get that colors are not inherently connected to a specific gender. Not purple, not pastell teal, not pink, not blue, not rainbow. None of the above.

I mentioned this, and somebody else* said that I was right, but pastell colors are calm and relaxing and welcoming. Like women I guess was the point he was trying to make.
Women aren't inherently calm and relaxing either. I mean, just look at me!

Of course I got kind of angry. I do that. I will freely admit that it pisses me off when color and gender based (or really anything based) stereotypes are called in as a good argument. But you know what's better to do than shouting angrily in all caps into a chat box? writing a reasonable blog post.

The issue kind of disappeared before the end of class, drifting away into the back of our minds. But it still bugs me, because this was something I've brought up before in class. I guess it's no wonder her word was "mauvais."

PDS, Lady E

* I would like to point out that not all the guys in my class were on the other side of the argument. I have mad respect for the guy who changed his chat color to bright pink after this conversation. Good on you, B.K.