Adventures in Freelance Insanity ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Blogging From Bed Want a glimpse into our bedroom? I know you do. Here's the sum total of our verbal conversation on Wednesday night (we have many "paarent" conversations wherein we talk to one/both of the boys and talk to each other in looks. You parents know what I mean). So here it is, all we said on Wednesday - Me: That guy is fucking shady as hell. Anyone care to guess what we were doing? Have a great weekend mes amis!!! 9:31 a.m. - 2006-03-24 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Friday Drugged Blogging Wisdom tooth melded into jaw bone at the hinge goes bad last Tuesday. Thursday they whip out the saws and cut out a piece of my jawbone and the offending tooth. Ouch. Pain pills for a day while I work then do without. Ouch. In the meantime, I am following a thread at Feministe about threads and derailment and feminism and racism and safe spaces and civility (it's all the same thread). I know I come off badly on the internet. Ironic since I write for a living. But as I have tried to explain (badly) the writing that I do online comes from a different place inside me, a place that doesnt write well. Kinda like my dad, who speaks for a living as well as teaching college at a prestigous university yet if somehow a stranger gets through to him in his personal space he stares at them in abject terror that he will have to interact with a human being. Maybe it's not the same thing, I have really really good drugs. Also ironic is that I got dry socket now. Every other horrid operation Ive ever had on my jaw (and Ive had a lot) I have literally lit up the second I was out the door. Screw waiting. I sucked the cigarettes as I drank diet coke and tried not to dribble or open my mouth enough to lose the gauze. This time, I dont smoke and I get dry socket. If there is a god, it's clear he hates me. On a very personal level. Which certainly sounds like the god of plenty of people i know. Sadly. So over on this thread i spoke of, someone asked who in the thread was Asian, African American, Native American or Latino. I went to say I was, reflexivly, and then I thought - well, isnt that the question. Twain wrote a story about a "colored" child and a white child that were switched at birth and the "colored" child was raised as the white heir. How is this possible? Because there was some weird-ass math voodoo that said you had to be less than 1/32 black in order to be white (im not totally stuck on the 32 number, its 32-ish tho). So basically, you can look completely white and still be black according to white people. Do white people get to decide who is what race? Why? I have always wondered who gets to define race. Is it defined by how disadvantaged you are? If you "pass" as white physically but are treated as "black" does that mean youre black? If you pass physically and are treated like a white person (with all the privilegde that entails) does that mean you are not black? (im using black as an example but insert any non-white ethnic group. I wondered this even more when my son was born and now that my second son is here it's even more pressing to me. I wonder because I am adopted. I am the adopted daughter of an adopted daughter. I have no ethnicity to fall back on, no racial history to claim or deny. When I was young I wanted to be a Native American boy (because my Natice American friend got to learn all sorts of cool stuff). When I was a teenager I didnt have to care as much because after elementary school people dont generally ask you (or they didnt ask me) "what" you are. In my early 20s I thought seriosuly about it. Although my blond hair and blue eyes would probably put me in the "white" catagory regardless of knowing or not-knowing, I decided that I didnt want to be part of any group that didnt include my sister. So I would also be African-American. Prove Im not. Then I married a Cherokee and had a son with him. Our son was born with blond hair and blue eyes. His hair is still blond in the summer and his eyes remain hazel. This is not what genetics 101 suggests happens. If he hadnt looked like his dad otherwise there wouldve been questions. Our son even looks like he has my fair skin. Im not so great with seeing, so maybe y'all say it right away but the only time I remember he is Native American is in the summer when he turns the most beautiful golden color you ever saw and never burns (damn him). Id like to point out that his hair in the previous picture was dyed at his request. Teenagers. Now, obviously, he is 1/2 Cherokee. But unless he tells people, no one seems to realize it. When I ask myself if race is defined as culture I think of my son. He knows fuck-all about the Cherokee (it is That Which Is Not Spoken Of in his dad's family). So does being 1/2 Cherokee not count if everyone thinks youre white and you dont know anything about being a Cherokee. (After he was born I added Native American to my list of "what" I was - African American (for my sister) and Native American. I thought maybe he was like some mutant gene splice until I had my second son. He too has very blue eyes and blond hair. His daddy is a swarthy-skinned dark-eyed italien reportedly borne of 2 other dark-eyed italiens. Also not the expected gene outcome for a child between us. So I had to consider that maybe I carry some white-masking gene. That if it can mask most of the other traits my kids definatly hold that it can certainly mask in me the other hald of a genetic gift ffrom my bio father. A gift that could very well be African-Amercian or Native American. So my idealogical "I want to be what the people I love are" could be reality. IS there any way to tell? I dunno. And I still dont know what defines race. Or who. If someone demands to know for a form or another what race I am I check African American, Native American and Asian (my best friend). I have seen people erase my answer and check "white" or listen to my verbal answer and do the same thing. It tends to infuriate me. Cause they DEFINATLY dont get to decide. But it always makes me remember that my sister, who "passes" as black, was told a long time ago that her birth mother was French-Canadian. When someone asks HER "what" she is, she responds "French Canadian". Which always makes me laugh. Did I mention how much I love my sister today? I wonder if she checks "white" and if she does, they change it right in front of her or under some pretence of PC they wait until she leaves to erase it. But I would bet any amount of money they erase it. Speaking of my sister, she has this theory that she whispers in hushed tones, acknowledging the absurdity while letting that inner demon free, that the man who raped us somehow found a way to destroy our teeth. We both have such bad teeth and the teeth that go bad in me go bad in her in the same order and at exactly the same interval of time. It's spooky. I discount her theory in my rational mind, while at the same time I build a theory that her INTENT (think intent's the wrong word) is right - his disregard of us and some incident we cant remember cause us to neglect our teeth/eat badly thereby making him the cause in absentia of our horrid teeth. But when I sit in the dentist's chair all I can think about is how my open mouth and pain filled being mirror a bad part of the rapist's very best wishes for us, I wonder if he really can make all our teeth rot. Did I mention these are really really good drugs? Pax et Lux - enjoy your life! 11:04 p.m. - 2006-03-17 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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