All the Lonely People, Rainbows, The Big Black Dog and Sex

Sunday, June 28, 2015

It is wet and dreary here. And Simon’s birthday. I was thinking of sneaking into his building and throwing flowers off the roof. I don’t know if that will help. I am beating this whole thing to death. Or at least trying to. All the lonely people should hang out more often.

Rainbows

Everywhere on Facebook, people are turning their profile pictures into rainbows. Perhaps it is just some silly Facebook trend, but when I see everyone’s face turned into rainbows, I feel happy. Some people have clever and political reasons for not changing their profile pictures.

Like this tweet from Che Gossett:

 

“Gay marriage will be another racist and colonial sign of which nations are civilized.”

Interesting. Okay. But what are we going to do? Revoke women’s right to vote? Another Facebook friend wrote about the oppressiveness of marriage as an institution. How the mythology of exclusive love conquering all perpetuates delusions and violence. Of course she is right to remember that there are still so many people left behind, all over the world. I don't know what to do. I am terrible at politics. And at forming sentences that contain the word “colonial.” Anything I say will make me sound like I’m in kindergarten. Silly white girl with rainbows on her face. I just find we are all so beautiful in rainbows.

All that said, please see my Important Addendum, Added on Friday, July 3, 2015

Eliot, and Sex

Eliot the Big Black Dog always liked to be involved during sex. Whenever he heard us kissing, he would make sure to be close by. If we were upstairs, he’d follow us, putting his nose up over the bed and wagging his tail. We’d tell him to lie down, and he would, but there wasn’t a chance he would leave the room.  After his legs got bad, he could no longer join us upstairs. He hated this. While we were at it in the bedroom, he would lie at the base of the stairs and make sooky noises, overcome by the injustice. The last time he got to take part was at the cottage, where all the rooms were on one floor. We’d started making out and getting busy in the guest room. Suddenly, we heard rhythmic banging against the wall.  Thump, thump, thump, thump. He was right next to us, wagging his tail enthusiastically, so so pleased with himself. We laughed so hard.

Eliot the Big Black Dog. He would have looked marvellous in rainbows

 

Important Addendum, Added on Friday, July 3, 2015: A Facebook friend shared this article in the Washington Post called "Why you should stop waving the rainbow flag on Facebook." The author Peter Moskowitz criticizes the slactivism inherent simply changing your profile picture and calling it a day. It made me consider that perhaps my above points are rather slack, and whether or not my whole rainbow section makes me seem naïve and dumb. But this isn't about me being naïve and dumb. The point is it's not really about me. I want to share a couple of quotes from Peter Moskowitz's article, and I truly hope you will take the time to read the whole thing.

"Gay pride was something I struggled to gain. As a gay man, I worked through years of bullying in school and overcame self-consciousness, loneliness and depression. The rainbow flag became a symbol of acceptance and confidence as I found my place in the LGBT community.

I’ve earned the right to claim pride through years of internal strife over my sexuality. Others have died in the name of gay pride. More still have been jailed, have been disowned by their families, and have sued their state governments for it. Gay pride is not something you can claim by waving a flag.

The rainbow symbol is easy to co-opt, but the experience it represents is not.

That’s why it wasn’t comforting to see hundreds of my Facebook friends’ profile pictures draped in rainbows. It didn’t feel like they were understanding my struggle; it felt like they were cheapening it, celebrating a victory they had no part in winning."

"It’s now easy, popular and politically expedient to raise the rainbow flag for marriage equality, since 60 percent of Americans support it. But being an LGBT person is still difficult. In some states, it’s still legal to be fired or evicted for being gay. And the gay marriage ruling won’t end the crises of homelessness, harassment and suicide suffered by LGBT people. A record number of LGBT people, especially trans women of color, are being killed and HIV rates are still astronomically high among gay and bisexual men.

Covering your profile picture in rainbow colors doesn’t change any of those truths. "

I am grateful to my Facebook friend who is always sharing interesting and important perspectives, and challenging what is often the easiest opinion. Although I have not yet changed my profile picture, I am taking time to consider the whole issue more deeply. In all likelihood, my next profile picture will probably be of me in my Tree Office. My most decisive politics include not owning furniture, drawing my femur bones back as much as possible, candid emotional intimacy, and varying rants about pubic hair and potty training.


Tree Office



Addendum Number Two

Well, I have one more addendum. Another friend of mine wisely pointed out that it's not necessarily fair to assume that everyone who has changed their profile picture doesn't have a story behind it, and that they haven't supported someone or some part of the movement. Not everybody is a lie down in the street activist, but that doesn't mean we don't embody love for all beings within our own lives. This can mean advocating for a friend or loved one amidst conservative relatives, modelling all-inclusive attitudes for our children, or, as is my case, referring everyone in the world to Dan Savage's podcast. I appreciate people with strong views and radical conviction, but I think there is futility and even danger in taking on a "fuck the world," "everything is a disaster" attitude. (Not that Moskowitz and my Facebook friend who posted his article are guilty of this; however, I do see this tendency within some activist movements.) Also, I heard something about Russia starting a profile picture fad that was meant to counteract all the rainbows on people's newsfeed. So maybe our rainbows count for something. And I still think we all look beautiful in rainbows. Okay, that's it.  

The End.

Once again, the link to the Washington Post article: Why You Should Stop Waving the Rainbow Flag on Facebook.

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How I am violent, by Erica J. Schmidt

Since May, I have been taking an online course called, Embodying Ethics and Vows. It is with Michael Stone and Elaine Pierce. This week, our assignment was to write about how we are working with the precept of not causing harm (ahimsa) in our lives. Here's what I got:

How I am Violent, by Erica J. Schmidt

Instead of non-violence, I am thinking about violence. This makes me think of my relationships, especially with Simon and with my body, but with the Boatman too. Everyone saves their violence up for someone, for something. Actually, I have no idea what everyone else does.

It is hard not to tell the same old story over and over again. The story of Simon, my ex-boyfriend who I fucked at the Granola Party, on the biodegradable yoga mat. I was really drunk, and he wasn’t. Perhaps this should have been the last time. Instead, there was a big saga of alcohol, vomit, both passionate and ambivalent sex, and name calling. We wrote all this down in letters that were supposed to be published in brilliant books that were supposed to allow me to quit my three and a half low-paying jobs.

Simon used to say that I was like an eight-year-old sore loser tennis player. And I was always losing the match and so being with me was unbearable. He didn’t understand how the Boatman was able to stand me. Simon was probably more right about this than I was when I wrote,

“Sometimes I think that it would kind of be ideal for you to die.

Then our book would be a huge success.  I could feel somewhat sorry for myself, because a guy I fucked died and that is always traumatizing.  Everyone would look at me with odd sympathy. Especially if you committed suicide.  The sympathy would be immense.  Oh poor poor, Erica.  You slept with a sick and twisted soul.  Scarred forever.  How terrible.”

Highly mediocre writing, and unkind. This was from the second volume of the Little Savage and the Hermit. I wasn’t really into writing this book. Simon wanted the plot to be about how I finally got an orgasm. I felt like this was a dumb plot.

I am not the reason Simon jumped off his apartment building. I can just hear him say, “I would never jump off a building for you, you stupid fucking cunt!” His voice carries a tinge of love.

Simon’s most recent girlfriend gave me pictures and memorabilia from the funeral. When I first put the pictures on my meditation alter, I told myself that after a week, I was allowed to take them down. It has been awhile. They are still there. One of his photos is in a disposable coffee cup that is covered with the stream-of-consciousness poem I wrote during my French Literature Class in 2009. Simon kept this cup all the way until he died.  Those cups don’t biodegrade.

The alter, with spectacular lighting.

Simon once said that based on a study they did on rats in the 1970’s, I will never ever get cancer. The rats who expressed their stress by freaking out didn’t die or get any diseases. At this rate, I will live until I’m 98.

Not every day can be fulfilling and lucrative and productive. Some days are for melting down. Yesterday was a meltdown day. It was the first time I had woken up at 5 a.m. for a while. That could have caused the meltdown. I also don’t think I ate properly the day before. All the trivial and banal things tend to matter. Alas. I was stressed because I had this assignment to write, and Thursday is also blogging day. I thought that maybe I could combine the two activities, although I wasn’t sure whether or not the world should know that I told Simon it might be better if he died. As a creative practice, I have vaguely committed to myself and my four and a half fans that I will blog every Monday and Thursday. It started off being fun. Now I am starting to crap out.

Writing, with all its potential for redemption can also be violent.  Same thing goes for meltdowns.

My favourite person to have a meltdown with is the Boatman. No one can console and contain my eight-year-old sore-loser-tennis-player-self better than him. Plus I don’t really want to really want to impose this self onto anyone else. Some friends say that I should limit my contact with the Boatman. Otherwise, how will I possible get over him, move on. The idea of getting over anyone is so silly.  How can we possibly get over anyone?

Well, I suppose I am over the Vegan Life Coach. God bless the Vegan Life Coach, and his spirulina powder.

The Boatman and I talk once or twice a week. I try to make sure each time is not a meltdown. I try to ask him about his life. That was one of my goals when I began the ethics course. To ask people about their lives.

Yesterday, I called the Boatman in tears. “I can’t keep calling you like this. I will keep doing this forever.” For the rest of my life, for the rest of the world, I will compartmentalize myself to resemble a manageable and acceptable human being. Then when the eight-year-old tennis player appears, I will excuse myself to call the Boatman. I’ll be eighty years old, forty-nine years into a marriage, with seventeen grandchildren. Some blogging drama will emerge. “Excuse me, honey,” I will say to my geriatric husband. “I need to melt down to the Boatman.” The Boatman will be eighty-eight.

“It’s okay,” the Boatman told me yesterday as I fretted and wept about my lack of meltdown autonomy. “You can just call me.” Maybe they can make a special Boatman Meltdown App.

As for my body, well, I cannot believe the violence I have imposed upon it. Sri W. Ham Wrap was right. My yoga practice was super violent, and  I cling to things until they die.

People always say, “My poor body,” and/or “My body is not happy with me,” and/or my body is angry with me. I know what they mean, but I wonder who they are talking about.

Or what about, “my back was killing me?” My back was killing me the day I went to meet Simon’s girlfriend. Earlier I had spent two hours on my bike, to visit a friend. Now I was walking. I felt that if anything in my clicky, crooked eighty-year-old spine were to shift .035 mm the wrong way, the whole thing would surely collapse. Someone would have to wheel me and my body away.

"Jesus," I thought. People think about Jesus when their backs hurt. I remembered listening to Ashtanga teacher Tim Feldman talking about his herniated discs. He could barely move, but he thought about his guru, Pattabhi Jois, who said, “You taking your yanus.” So Tim started squeezing his anus like nobody’s business. Somehow this helped. Seemed a bit simplistic to me, or rather, perhaps too complicated. But what else could I do? As I walked, I brought my awareness to my anus and pelvic floor. I didn’t squeeze, I just thought about it. I considered how it was all connected to my feet that were touching the ground. And how my sitbones were also somewhat connected to my nostrils. And how the crown of my head sort of balanced on top of everything. There was still pain, but by the time I arrived at Simon’s girlfriend’s house, it felt like maybe things had shifted 0.035 mm away from me being in a wheelchair.

It is a good idea to try and keep your body happy.

This afternoon I’ll be taking a stab at my dream job. I am going to help a three-year-old learn how to use the potty. Very little is more grounding than helping someone else to take a shit.

The End.

The cup with the biodegradable poem on it
Follow me on Twitter: @mypelvicfloor
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Simon Girard, 1979-2015
The Benefits of an Ashtanga Yoga Practice, Part Two
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The Real Me 

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