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Nobosodrou, a Mangbetu woman in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

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Blue Lives and domestic terror. I see you.

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“One of my earliest memories is sitting in a sand box and watching the other kids play. I could see their mouths moving but couldn’t hear what they were talking about. They seemed so happy. And I desperately wanted to participate. But my deafness kept me in a glass cage. I was never able to verbally speak. And whenever I tried to reach out, I’d be forgotten quickly. During recess I’d sit alone and read my books, because it hurt too much to look at the other kids. In high school I had an interpreter who predicted I’d never marry. She said that disabled people were too much of a burden for abled people. It was a casual remark for her, but I never forgot it. And the few flings I had as a teenager only reinforced that belief. None of the guys I dated learned sign language. They didn’t even try. I think they viewed dating a deaf girl as more of a novelty than anything. And every time it didn’t work out, I was left feeling lonelier. I went to college two hours away. Which wasn’t far, but it was far for me. And I first met Stuart in my education class. He tried to say ‘hello’ that very first day, but I accidentally ignored him. I think he figured out the reason once my interpreter showed up. But he kept smiling at me, and a few days later he slid me a photo with a note on the back and his email address. I spent a lot of time looking at that photo, waffling back and forth about whether I should contact him. But finally I decided there was nothing to lose. We began spending time together outside of class. We’d communicate by writing back and forth in a notebook. I learned all about his life. And he learned about mine. After a few months of this, I started to have hope, maybe he was actually interested in my thoughts. Maybe he liked me for me. One night we were watching a scary movie in my dorm room. We were writing back and forth, laughing at the cheesy scenes, when suddenly Stuart’s face grew serious. He wrote that he needed to tell me something. My heart sank.  I thought: This is where he tells me that I’m a lot of fun, but my deafness is a dealbreaker. But he looked me in the eyes, took a deep breath, and haltingly began to sign: ‘Will. You. Be. My. Girlfriend?’”

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Zuhair Murad Fall 2021 Bridal Couture Collection

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A post shared by MONTECRISTO Magazine (@montecristo_mag) on Jul 29, 2020 at 1:07pm PDT

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michaela coel for british gq

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I know people like this. Sad.

You hate yourself so loudly. You hate yourself at the top of your lungs. Your loathing for yourself permeates your speech. “Sorry I’m just rambling.” “Don’t worry about it.” “Just ignore me.” “Sorry if I’m annoying you.” “Sorry I don’t make sense.” “Sorry about that.” Sorry, sorry, sorry. You act as if you have to beat everyone else to the punch. As if the punching bag is you. If you hate yourself first, if you hate yourself loudest, then nobody will hurt you. You clapped your hands over your ears and shut your eyes and balled yourself up so that you’d never have to experience people’s loathing for you. And it meant you never heard their love. You drowned it out. You screamed your hatred over it. And you never got to hear it. 

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This picture is so deep!

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So I just now learned about Stagecoach Mary and how have I never heard of this absolute LEGEND of a woman before

She was born a slave and freed when the Emancipation Proclamation was issued (she was about 30)

She was about six feet tall and 200 pounds and once she was free she decided she’d never take shit from anyone ever again

When one of her close friends, a nun by the name of Mother Amadeus, became ill with pneumonia at her convent in Montana, Mary headed alone into the frontier to nurse Mother Amadeus back to health

After Mother Amadeus recovered, she gave Mary a job as the foreman of the convent. She repaired buildings, took care of chickens, made the long and dangerous journeys into town for supplies, and did other odd jobs.

She could drink most men under the table, and one saloon offered five bucks and a free shot of whiskey to any man who could take a punch to the face from Mary and remain standing. 

She was once said by a local paper to have broken more noses than anyone else in Montana

She was outspokenly Republican, which at this time was the liberal party in America, and would get into political debates with the more conservative townsfolk

One time a man insulted her outside the saloon so hit him in the face with a rock, and only stopped when other cowboys held her back.

On one supply run into town, her wagon overturned and the horses fled. Mary spent all night single-handedly fending off a pack of wolves with her guns before she righted the heavy wagon by herself and tracked down the spooked horses. The only thing lost in the accident was a jar of molasses.

She lost her job at the convent when she got into a gunfight with a male employee who did not want to take orders from a black woman. She reportedly shot him in the ass, which angered the local bishop.

After losing her convent job, Mary spent a brief time running a restaurant, where she welcomed and served all comers

When a job for a mail carrier opened at the local US Post Office, Mary got the job because she managed to hitch six horses to a wagon faster than any of the male candidates

She was sixty at the time

This made her the first black woman mail carrier, and the second woman mail carrier in US history

When the snows were too deep for the horses to manage the long and dangerous delivery routes, Mary would strap on snowshoes, put the bags of mail on her shoulders, and do it herself

At one point she apparently had a pet eagle????

She only retired from the mail route when she was about 70 years old, and instead made a quieter living by babysitting and running a laundry business in the town of Cascade

She was a huge baseball fan and often gave the local team a big bouquet of flowers from her garden

The people of Cascade loved Mary so much that they closed the schools annually on her birthday

When a law was passed in Montana that forbade women from drinking in saloons, the mayor of Cascade granted Mary an exemption. 

When her house burned down, the whole town got together to help her build a new one

She continued drinking, fighting, and going to baseball games until she died of liver failure at 82 in 1914

Mary (far right) and the local baseball team

Anyway sorry for gushing I just now heard about her and I’m in love

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“I grew up in the village behind me. It’s very beautiful here but there are few opportunities. Whenever I think about my children’s prospects, I grow sad. I have nothing to provide for them so they’ll probably end up like me, taking whatever work they can just to survive. My parents died when I was ten. I went to live with my aunt and my uncle. They never gave me grief. They never made me feel bad. But they were also poor, and every time we sat down to eat, I felt like I was stealing from their family. The guilt grew so bad that when I turned 15, I tried to build a shed for myself. I lived there for about six months. But then the winter came. And eventually the cold grew stronger than the guilt.” (Hunza Valley, Pakistan)

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What I learned from protesting in Ferguson

1. Don't post pics of fellow protestors. Wear face masks, helmet, googles

2. Turn off your location on your phone. Leave it even. It will be an alibi for you

3. Carry milk with you. Someone in the group should have a leaf blower to blow back gas

4. Travel in groups. Never alone. Move swiftly.

5. Don't go to a protest without knowing about a local bail relief fund. Write the number on your arm.

6. Remember this has happened before and it will happen again unless we have courage.

Burn it all down.