elusivenothings-blog - Tumblr blog

[elusivenothings-blog]

The Internalized Misogyny of a Feminist

When I believe I might endure an unwanted pregnancy, internalized misogyny rears its ugly head again. I think about how disappointed the man I had sex with will be when I tell him that our exciting nights together didn’t work out as planned because we didn’t luck out with our unprotected sex. And I know that I’m to blame for this, as if I can will my uterus into rejecting our bodies’ relentless survival instincts and use the strength of my fear to force my body into submission with the same vigor that men have used to force women’s bodies into submission for all of human existence. I don’t want to tell him until I am certain; this crippling anxiety stalking me through the day and haunting me through the night should not be shared, should not dig its teeth into two people when one can choose to shoulder it alone. That “one”, of course, is I. Once I know for sure, once I have a prettier package to present to my partner, then I will involve him. Until then I will enable him to live the same carefree life that I begrudge men for and grieve against on a weekly basis. I will build resentment towards men for not having to deal with all the problems that women deal with, all while protecting this man fiercely against the problems that this woman is dealing with. Because what else can I do? This is the reasoning that I give myself, because honesty somehow falls off the table when the fear of rejection is involved. What if I tell him and he thinks I’m crazy? What if he’s moved on in the 9 days since I’ve last seen him? What if he thinks that I’m just trying to keep him interested in me? What if I AM just trying to keep him interested and have invented this pregnancy scare as a way to keep him close? What if I’m as crazy as the fear of being crazy makes me feel? See how things escalate? So I live in my pretty house of lies and even if he wanted to come inside he couldn’t because he doesn’t have the address, doesn’t even know that this house exists or that I’m hiding out in it. Maybe he has his own house of lies somewhere else- a beachfront perhaps- where he hides out from his life as well. Maybe he worries that I’ve moved on in the 9 days since I’ve seen him. Maybe he spends his days in his house of cards building smaller houses of cards to distract him from the truth of his own life, because truth could lead to pain and pain somehow seems unbearable, though we have weathered it every single time it visits.

[elusivenothings-blog]

Child of a terminally ill parent

The feeling of having someone sick in the house- a feeling that is at once all-consuming and never mentioned. There is a sort of tip-toeing about that happens, not wanting to make the sick feel guilty or coddled and not wanting to make the healthy feel grim at the prospect of imminent death. My sister offers to read a poem to my mother. The poem mentions perseverance and discusses tragedy and the strength that follows at its heels; love is weaved throughout its words. The message is subtle but pressumably understood by all who overhear it, though no one will speak it plainly- “This is for you, to offer comfort when times get unspeakably hard.” They are someone else’s words and that distance makes everyone feel safer. It is an act of crystalline good intention, yet distressingly feeble. All is feeble in the face of death. There is a sense of trying to prepare, and trying to put off. Paradoxes abound, as they have since the beginning of all life, yet now there is a spotlight on each side of the coin, highlighting the painful contrasts. We are powerless but we fight, we will brace ourselves for the inexorable pain, we hope for an impossible outcome. Our eyes are open and the stimulation rushing in is overwhelming. 

[elusivenothings-blog]

Dreams

She knew her dreams could speak, and she’d see flashes of them in waking life like fireflies circling in the evening- appearing just long enough to catch her eye before camouflaging themselves once again against the dark expanse. In the daylight these images crackled in her mind elusively and uncontrollably, but when she slept they blossomed and she came alive.