My last post from South Dakota.

Friday is moving day. It's all boxes and cleaning products in here. I've heard from two people - one of whom is related to a Floyd Management employee - that Floyd Management does not give back security deposits. I wish I'd heard this before I spent an hour last night and another hour this morning cleaning the stovetop. Though, I must say, it does give me a little boost to see it gleam in the light, its new drip pans sparkling. It's really quite pretty. Anyway, I will no longer knock myself out cleaning the place, which means less work to do tomorrow.

I think we're in good shape. We're about at that phase where you think you're done, but you really have several more hours of labor ahead of you before you're actually done. For my last major move, this phase came at about midnight or 1am, and we pulled an all-nighter. Moving after staying up packing all night, and then having to clean the apartment, is not an experience I'd like to recreate. So, I think we're in pretty darn good shape, since I can go to bed tonight and still have plenty of time (I hope!) to finish up tomorrow.

One thing I learned about Mr. Plain(s) Feminist that surprised me is that he apparently packs boxes of books more quickly than I do. (Which is also lucky for him, as I've been packing my books all week and he's only just begun today to pack his.)

Bean has surprised me throughout by being very positive about the whole thing. I'm a little worried he'll have a meltdown when the place is actually empty and we leave. He is planning to hug the building goodbye. In truth, I feel a little like hugging it, myself. I've really loved living here, and I'm sad to go. This is by far the nicest apartment we've had, and it felt like home from the moment I walked in the door. We've all grown attached, and we've all been comfortable.

Plus, we've been spoiled by having the laundry just off the kitchen. I'm not looking forward to doing my laundry in a basement again!

But - a new adventure awaits. My next post will be from another, larger city a bit further north...stay tuned...

The sky, five minutes ago.

Why I love living in the midwest! Click for larger images.

My right foot.

In a minute, I'll be heading off to see a podiatrist about my - I hate the word; there's something embarrassing about it - bunion. In middle school, I had to cut short my dreams for a career as a prima ballerina and give up the toe shoes because I had weird feet. The chief concern appeared to be bunions, esp. on my right foot. The podiatrist gave me shoe inserts and essentially doomed me to a life of ugly shoes. I eventually was able to give up the inserts and to wear fun shoes and heels, but I always had to be very careful with what I put on my feet.

Some time later, I hurt my back and found that I couldn't wear heels of any kind. That's not really a huge sacrifice, except that there are some outfits that really don't look right without shoes with heels.

In more recent years, though, after I managed to mostly cure my back problems through yoga, I once again began wearing unsensible shoes. And it felt good for my self-esteem, if not for my feet. In fact, my feet were quite unhappy with the shoes, but I wore them anyway. Some of the worst offenders turned out to be - big surprise - Payless shoes, which are cheaply and poorly made. (Advice to all shoe-wearers: always pay more for your shoes. Pay less for everything else, but the shoes should be excellent quality.)

There was one pair dancing shoes, in particular, that I blame for my current predicament. They were gorgeous - velvety Mary Janes with a dancin' heel and a big flower on each toe. They were decadent, sexy, and they felt wonderful on my feet. Though...after a while, I did notice that my right big toe would be numb for a few days after I wore them out dancing. And after more time had passed, I noticed that the numb feeling never quite went away.

One night, the cab we'd called never showed up when the club closed, and we had to walk about a mile and a half. In the shoes. And my feet hurt so bad that I wanted to cry, but I was in so much pain that I didn't have the energy for tears.

Sometime after this, I realized that the shoes, once comfortable, no longer felt good on my feet. All the dancing, combined with the long march, had worn them out. So I tossed them. But it was too late - the damage had been done, and now, every pair of shoes I put on was uncomfortable. For the first time since middle school, the bunion was back - and this time, it hurt.

When I called my doctor for a recommendation yesterday, she said, "oh, so you're ready to have the surgery?" I told her I most certainly was not thinking along those lines at all, and she said, "there are two kinds of bunions: surgical and non-surgical." And she's sent me to a podiatrists that does this surgery, so I guess we'll see what he has to say.

Meanwhile, I'll be cleansing my shoe collection of my two pairs of Payless boots. I'll have to think long and hard about the clunky Nine West lace-ups and the three-inch ankle-wraps (SOB - it kills me to think about parting with these).

I'm heartbroken at the thought of Naturalizers for the rest of my life...

The days just go by...

I should be packing. In a minute, I will log off the computer, turn on the t.v., and plop down in front of it with some boxes that need assembly. But I have the lack of motivation and the overwhelmed feeling that come in pairs whenever there's a big job to do.

Also, I went to the gym this morning, did my full lifting program (yay!) and then wiped out after about 7 minutes on the bike. I don't know why. I suspect I set the level way too high. So I came home on wobbly legs, fully planning to go to the grocery store and buy some healthy food, and instead I ate the Dairy Queen cupcake that's been sitting in the freezer for Bean (who didn't know it was there, anyway, so don't look at me like that) and finished off the rest of yesterday's very sugary chocolate cream pie. So now I'm tired, wobbly, and feeling fat.

Oh, yeah, and every five minutes or so, some new thought occurs to me with a little panicky flutter about something else that needs to be done - like, just now, I realized that I haven't send my new address to the credit card companies yet.

You can see why it's infinitely pleasurable, in the face of putting all of our belongings into boxes, to do things like buy a new slipcover for the chair and shop for a new futon and plan what color throw pillows to buy. (Which is what I have been doing for the last two days instead of packing.)

Balancing...

OK. I've finally got Bean registered for school AND for aftercare. And I lined up a babysitter for the night I teach an evening class. I'm planning to bring him with me on the few occasions I have to be in the office on a weekend - I can set him up in the corner with a DVD and he'll be happy as pie. I hope. Whew! I don't mind telling you that I've been carrying around a lump of anxiety about this for the last several weeks, never sure that it was all going to work out. You see, Mr. Plain(s)feminist is going to be commuting for a while, so many of the things I usually take for granted, like another parent being around, are presenting challenges.

But for now, we're good. Unless Bean gets into the magnet school, in which case aftercare will be a problem. But I'm only going to worry about one thing at a time.

I am subsuming all my worry into moving details. Today I head over to UHaul and Target to pick up boxes and tape. And then I'm faced with the problem of, once packed, where to put the many boxes? The books alone will take at least 45-50 boxes. No joke. I think I'll have to dismantle the living room bookcase and put it in the garage so that there's room for the book boxes. And even so, that's a huge mountain o' boxes!

Actually, just the thought of that many boxes is making me queasy. I'm off to see what else we can bear to part with...

Tommy, Tommy, Tommy (and other tales of cable)...

...if it turns out that you drowned that baby, you won't recover from it. I don't mean you'll keep boozing and sleeping around and ruin your life - I mean, you'll lose your viewers. There's no way we're ready to watch a man drop a baby in the river and walk away. It's just not going to happen. I mean, I already barely watch you anymore. You and your buddies at the firehouse started out as flawed but redeemable characters. But now, you're just sexist, racist, homophobic, and more importantly - because you could've overcome those traits - you're just plain mean. Even Television Without Pity says, "TWoP readers didn't really take to the tale of a firefighter who was often drunk, irresponsible, sexist, racist, and homophobic, and therefore, it's time to turn the hose on Rescue Me."

And while we're on the topic, I don't really care that the gender "issues" brought to the fore on Mad Men are true to the era. They make me damn angry to watch. What is the point? Yes, television is supposed to make one think, but it's not supposed to make me pissed-off for no reason. I have enough sexism to deal with in daily life without needing to reach back into the sixties for a fix, thank you very much.

Now, Damages I'm enjoying. So far. But it strikes me that this is a show that will very quickly go the way of Lost. Too much intrigue, too many promised answers that lead to more cliffhangers, and I will stop watching. Damages writers, I hope you're approaching this show like Murder One and that all will become clear by the end of the season. I'm not prepared to give you longer than that. If I had the time for twisted plots that never ended, I'd go back to watching soap operas. I like my dramas tied up in a neat bow at the end of the season.

For this reason, my new favorite show is Survivorman. Drop him on top of a mountain, in the ocean, on a deserted island, and he survives. Alone. Without food. Without a film crew. He does it all himself. And I'm damn impressed, both at his skill and also at the Discovery Channel's ingenuity in thinking this one up. I will definitely keep watching.

Starting Kindergarten.

For the last couple of years, people have been asking me if Bean would be starting Kindergarten this fall or if I'd be keeping him back a year. In New York, this would be kind of an odd question, and it would imply that the asker thought that Bean had some deficiencies in social skills or that he wasn't intellectually ready for Kindergarten. One wouldn't ask such a question, generally, without cause.

But in South Dakota, this question is asked frequently, and I know many people who have opted to keep their kids home for an extra year. The reasons range from the parent feeling the child isn't ready for school, which, in my personal experience, seems to be more likely when the child hasn't been in daycare or preschool prior to Kindergarten, to the *parent* not being ready (and, again, in my personal experience, this seems to come along with fears of the child eventually graduating high school and heading off to college at the age of 17 rather than 18 (which is exactly what I did, so I confess to not really understanding this particular fear)). There is also the impact of sports on this decision: as I understand it, the age cutoff for sports is different from the age cutoff for school, so kids can begin Kindergarten but not be allowed to play rookie baseball (or whatever). So some parents keep the kids back so that they can play sports with their grade level (or even so that they can be physically larger and more skilled as compared to others in their grade level).

This has always seemed weird to me, as a product of a very different culture with re. to schooling. So, when I was in my soon-to-be-new-city in Minnesota last month getting Bean registered for Kindergarten, I was shocked (happily so) to see that many (all?) of the public elementary schools in the city had an option for Pre-Kindergarten for qualifying four-year-olds that was part of the public school curriculum. Four-year-olds who were deemed ready (and how this readiness was ascertained, I'm not exactly sure, but I think it meant that they knew their alphabet and were basically reading to learn to read and could recognize numbers) could begin to go to Pre-K programs in the schools.

I was so struck by the enormous difference between these two states that lie right next to each other that I couldn't help but to expound upon it to anyone who would listen - and the MN public school employees were fairly shocked to hear of my experiences in SD.

It seems to me that if we are really going to be serious about education, then we need to make sure that children are better prepared to start school than they appear to be in SD. This means that sports should not be preventing kids from starting Kindergarten on time (or early). Sports programs need to get in sync with the school district age cutoffs. Pre-K should be available at every public school. And, while there are certainly some children who benefit from starting school later, parents should be better educated - and the school district should be involved in this process - so that parents have more information upon which to base these decisions.

(I've also posted this entry on Dakota Women - see link at right.)

On pants-wearing (not).

(I actually wrote this in July, shortly before I left on my long summer trip, which is nearly over, and I planned to post it long before now. However, spotty internet access and vacation-induced stupidity made me forget about it. So here it is.)

I was just reading over at Friday Playdate about kids not wearing pants, and it reminded me that I'd also been reading some musings on the same theme at Dooce. And so that, then, made me consciously realize that I, too, often don't put on pants in the house after awakening. Eventually, I'll throw on a pair of shorts, or if it's chilly, sweats, but the early morning will find me sitting at the computer, checking my email in my undies, right by the front door, which Mr. Plainsfeminist seems to like to open, without warning, while I'm sitting there. (And then he gets irritated when I yell at him about it, for some reason.)

Bean is also going through that brutally honest phase that kids go through, which is one reason I suspect that certain people (you know the ones) don't like kids. You know what I mean - "look at that fat lady" or "why does that man gots no hair?" kind of statements, the comments kids made that make you want to curl up and die. So what this means for me is that I have to hear about my bad breath and "poky" legs all the time. It's giving me a complex. Adults do not have sweet, flower-smelling breath the way some kids do (they really do, sometimes, though not Bean after a garlic spinach pocket - I can practically smell him in the next room). But all of a sudden, Bean keeps complaining that I have bad breath, and I am starting to think that maybe I'm not eating the right foods or something and am having a ketosis problem since he never complained before. It's making me very self-conscious, and I find myself sucking on breath mints and keeping my hand over my mouth a lot.

The "poky" legs thing is simply that Bean does not care to sit on my lap when I am wearing shorts and my legs are not freshly shaven. I get frequent orders to "put on long pants!" because he objects to the pokiness of even the slightest amount of stubble.

Basically, I feel like a sasquatch with bad breath these days.

But I'm thinking that my prediliction for pants-lessness might partly explain why Bean emerged from his room this afternoon, while we had company, with his underpants on his head, and bare nekkid from the waist down. I, myself, am not much into hats, so I can't really explain the headgear. However, given these options, I think I much prefer smelly sasquatch-ness to this young Frank Barone behavior. (Incidentally, this link will take you to one of the more poorly-written Wikipedia entries I've come across so far.)

So, I've finished the new Harry Potter.

And I have no one to talk about it with, as no one in my family is reading the series. Sigh.

I'll just say that it was good, it did everything I wanted it to in terms of tying up the loose ends and providing a resolution, and there were a few things that I turned out to be right about.

Also, I think I finished it in record time, considering that I only started reading yesterday afternoon.

I'm disappointed, now, that the stories are finished.

Boom chicka wakka wakka wow...

Yesterday, I was in the grocery store, and I passed by a young man who had shaped sideburns that were...how should I say...reminiscent of the '70s in a way that isn't exactly decent. In other words, there was a nearly audible soundtrack that followed him as he pushed his cart down the aisle, and I desperately wanted to burst forth with a "wakka wakka boom chicka boom" as per the infamous Axe commercial. If I had been a braver person, and one able to refrain from laughing hysterically (how many takes do you think they had to do for that commercial?), I might have done so. Because, seriously, one should not be allowed to have bad '70s porn sideburns and walk the streets without hearing a few "wakka wakka wows."

As it was, I bit my lip (hard), fought back the tears in my eyes, turned my laughter into a cough, and went off in search of the sauerkraut.

Support the Lesbian Seven.

I hadn't followed this story because I naively assumed that it was such a ludicrous case that of course the court would find in favor of the defendants. (And, also, I refuse to watch sensationalistic news much anymore, so you can imagine what that leaves me with.)

Sometimes I wonder what planet I think I'm living on.

Anyway, if you haven't kept up with this story, please go to Heart's blog and read about it. And then consider helping.

Specifically, what is needed is:
*Pro-bono legal support for the appeal.
*Media contacts and writers.
*Pen pals for the women who are in prison.
*Money for legal fees, collect calls from prison, transportation costs upstate for prison visits, paying for prison commissary.
*Diverse organizational support: Building a public campaign requires support from all
corners. If you think the sentences these women are receiving are too harsh, there is a place for your support.

For more information about how to get involved, please contact:
Bran Fenner [bran@fiercenyc.org], Jessica Robertson [jessonia@gmail.com], or Jessica Stern [sternj@hrw.org].

Eight things.

I'm so tired that I'm wired. Can't sleep. Eyes are shutting but my body is twitching. In a minute I'm going to flop on the couch with a movie. But first:

(I neglected to post that I was tagged by Jessica Dreadful! Sorry!)

* We have to post these rules before we give you the facts.* Players start with eight random facts/habits about themselves.

* People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.

* At the end of your blog post, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.

* Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.

Sadly for you, all eight of my things are moving-related. Sorry.

1) Stucco houses make me depressed. When I was a kid, we knew someone who had a huge problem with a leak in their stucco house - one whole wall was a mess - and ever since then, I see stucco and think "damp, mildew, water damage."

2) I am moving into a stucco house that thankfully does not conform to this expectation. (Yes, that means I did find a place!)

3) I have printed out all the photos that I took of the new place and have been busily writing things like "my dresser here" and "Bean's workspace here" on the walls in the photos. I can't tell if this means I am super-organized or super-OCD.

4) I just went through my huge, four-drawer filing cabinet, and I still can't bear to part with my college papers. Not because they are useful or well-written, you understand, but because they give me a brief whiff of what it felt like to be me in college, and in that way, they're kind of like diaries. Diaries, I keep.

5) We are getting rid of our record albums. Mr. Plainsfeminist is, as I type this, burning them all onto cds. This is a very freeing prospect! I am giddy with the thought of having the space that their absence will leave. I haven't felt this liberated since I smashed most of my record collection in 1989. (Don't ask. But it meant I didn't have to haul those heavy milk cartons of records around to new apartments anymore, and it was awesome.)

6) While sorting out the crap to keep and the crap to toss, I found some photos (yes, I wasted about an hour this afternoon sorting photos, because the fifty or so doubles that I threw away will save SO much room on the truck) taken of the apartment we used to live in in NY when the people who moved in after us were living there. The photos reminded me that either I need some serious decorating help or else we need to get some stuff that is less "graduate student." I mean, I like that my stuff doesn't match. I think it's "funky and eclectic." But when I have to put all the funky and eclectic stuff close together, so that Great Aunt's big cherry secretary is next to the seven-foot unfinished bookcase my dad built...let's just say the next tenants had a bit more flair. And I need some flair. I need something to pull all my crap together into a "look." (That something might be a huge house, the space of which would allow my mismatched stuff the room it needs to become funky.)

7) In my haste to get rid of stuff, I've become addicted to Freecycle. (If you haven't Freecycled, you really need to check this shit out.)

8) I am beginning to hate Bean's teacher. She keeps having the class do these tremendous art projects, and then she sends the kids home with the pieces. We have one four-foot-tall purple space alien, one three-foot-long fish, and one life-size painting of Bean, among other things. I am expected to keep all of these, of course, as Bean loves them all dearly. Where the heck am I supposed to put them? Why couldn't these projects be smaller in scale? Now I have to pack this stuff!!! I am considering an installation in the back hallway of the new place...

I'm supposed to tag people now. I know this is a cop-out, but please consider yourself tagged. If you don't have a blog, feel free to post your eight things as a comment.

Looking for a place to live really sucks.

And the thing is, I always forget this. I always think that it's going to be fun and that I'll get to look at lovely places and pick the one I like the best. I don't know from whom I've gotten this naive gene, but I definitely could not have been more wrong. I think maybe I had one experience in Hartford in the early '90s where I got to see some really nice places, and I keep remembering that and blocking out all the rest of the awful ones, like the place with no stove or refrigerator (just a sink in the kitchen, and a line of people ahead of me who were nevertheless filling out applications), or the little claustrophobic crawl-space (I am not exaggerating or kidding), or the places that were obviously infested.

I always forget that looking at places to rent means looking at utter crap. I don't understand why it is that people would even show a place that is filthy. One Craigslist ad boasted about the jacuzzi in the bathroom, but by the time I made it through the stained-carpeted, dirty, bug-infested apartment that I was too polite to leave immediately, the thought of actually bathing in that tub made me nauseous.

The first house that I looked at wasn't bad - it was very nicely decorated and maintained. The rooms were too small for our furniture, though, so I couldn't even consider it. I was surprised to find that the homeowner had chosen to fill the master bedroom - which was quite small - with an enormous bed that made it difficult to move around the room. Whatever. It was nice, but not in a great neighborhood, and the "basement" was, in fact, a painted cellar. Not a place where I would want to spend much time. I don't like basements, and I especially do not like cellars.

Most of the rest of the places I saw were obviously intended for student housing, meaning that the landlords hadn't bothered to clean the place up (or get the tenants to clean it up), nor had they bothered to fix anything so that the place was in obvious disrepair.

Landlords: Treat your renters with some respect! Fix things. Pay attention to the outside of the home, as well. Make the house look nice. Don't assume that the renters won't notice. And please, don't bring me into a home if you haven't notified the tenants. It was really embarrassing to stand there while the tenant yelled at you for coming in without calling first (or even knocking!). And don't, in that case, tell the tenant that you disagree with his interpretation of the law. Just do the decent thing and apologize. You didn't impress me as a landlord when you surprised your tenant that way, and when you then chose to argue with him, you certainly did not make me want to rent from you.

Renters: Why is it necessary, when moving, to take all of your clothes out of the drawers and leave them in piles around the apartment? I don't need to see your underwear, nor would I want you, if you were coming through my apartment, to see mine. And never, in any of my moves, have I needed to put all of my clothes into little piles along the floor in order to pack them.

To that one very nice landlord who put up with Bean rampaging around the apartment: I am so, so sorry. He was supposed to stay in the car with my mom precisely so that that wouldn't happen, but he got out and followed me, and it was a busy street, and I was really stuck. You, sir, are a prince among men, and again, I apologize.

More proof that "you guys" is gender neutral.

Allison Bechdel says so. Which is good enough for me.

Off to the big city...

...to find a place to live. Comment moderation is on, as I won't have internet access for about a week. See you when I get back - hopefully, I'll have a new address!

Clarifying my NWSA post

So much for trying to be subtle.

It's been pointed out to me that what I posted and what I meant are not necessarily the same thing, so I want to correct any mis-impressions. This, of course, means being a lot more obvious about who I am and who is currently irritating me than I generally like to do on this blog.

I wrote this in my earlier post:
"If you come to a conference for the first time, instead of whinging about "where are all the panels about x" and "why is NWSA so racist/classist/etc.," you might think about why *you* didn't bother to propose a panel about x. And then propose one for next year."

I did not mean to imply - though it is clearly implied, anyway - that criticisms of the NWSA for being racist/classist/etc. are groundless. I've been involved with NWSA for about 11 years, and during that time, it has wrestled with inclusion, accessibility, and many, many other issues that have at times threatened to break the institution apart.

I also did not mean to imply, but nevertheless did, that I don't take such criticisms seriously. I do indeed take them seriously. In fact, on many occasions, I have made these criticisms.

What I *was* trying to address was a trend I've noticed in the bi/trans group particularly, which is to come to the conference and focus only on the panels and issues that are relevant to that interest group, and from that, to declare that NWSA is conspiring to oppress trans people. Now, NWSA still has a ways to go on trans issues, though I think it's worthy of mention that in a couple of years, it has done two things that I never, ever thought it would do: it's added "gender identity/expression" (I'm not sure of the exact wording) to its non-discrimination policy, and it's made a statement opposing women-born-women only policies. That doesn't mean we're out of the woods. But I helped found the bi/trans group a while back because the bi and transphobia were clearly evident (and I will write about my experiences with these at NWSA another time). I have definitely seen huge strides in the right direction since then.

So what I'm angry about has nothing to do with the practice of calling NWSA to account for itself, which I think is a healthy and important practice. I'm angry about people who come to the conference wanting to be pissed off; they enter without ever looking around to see what anyone else's interests/concerns are; they resist, year after year, making alliances with other groups and never bother to attend other groups' meetings unless they suspect that they need to show up to make a point about inclusion; they refuse to take part in the life of the organization, showing up at general assembly meetings only long enough to vote on their own interests - and on more than one occasion, asking other groups to support them in their votes and then skipping out before voting with those other groups on the votes of those groups.

It is not a coalition effort, and that is what I object to most.

And re. my point about taking responsibility for proposing the necessary papers/panels - I just mean that it's one thing to criticize an organization. It's another to criticize it as being too this or not enough that and "why isn't anyone doing anything about this" and then to state openly that you have never been there before, and you have no interest in getting involved, and you plan not to attend in the future, though you might be willing to do some guerilla consciousness raising. What the fuck? Why bother? What point, what greater transformation, do you hope will be made?

And to think it is a radical move to get on the committee that reviews paper submissions - thereby overhwelming the conspiracy to prevent trans panels from being accepted - is just silly, since there are open invitations to be on that committee, which anyone would know if they got involved in the organization and read the newsletters and the emails from the organization.

I keep thinking of the year when the bi/trans group attempted to torpedo the Feminist Mothering Task Force's (then called "Feminist Mothers and Allies) transition to a Caucus. What happened was this. I had earlier been to the bi/trans meeting as a participant, but also to ask for support for this shift to a caucus. The group agreed. But later, at the assembly at which we were all to vote on the shift to caucus-hood, one of the bi/trans group members suddently raised the concern that the name of the group excluded trans parents, and the group made clear that it would not vote for the Feminist Mothers group to become a caucus unless the name was changed. We saw no problem with discussing a name change, but the group needed to vote on the name change, and only a few members of the group were present (usually, a name change would be done over time and with the input of the group members).

That was not enough. And we came very close to losing the chance to become a caucus, after ten years of trying, during which I was the only member of the bi/trans group to become involved in the Feminist Mothering group.

Since the bi/trans group felt strongly about being included in the Feminist Mothering group - and I, too, feel that this inclusion is important - and made clear that members wanted to participate, we sent them a few invitations to participate in the group: to be part of the discussion about our name change that followed, to submit panels with us on parenting and trans issues, to join the caucus. We never received even one response.

And all of that I remember when I walk into a meeting and hear about what a horrible organization NWSA is and how oppressive it is, and I look around and see people who resist and refuse the effort that is necessary to transform an organization. The Women of Color Caucus, the Lesbian Caucus, the Feminist Mothering Caucus - we struggle with NWSA. But we also work with it. There are examples of groups that have, at times, succumbed to the NWSA's indifference, such as the Disability Caucus. But one cannot transform an organization if one refuses to be a part of it, and that, at bottom, is the root of my anger and frustration.

***

I have not yet discussed the safety issues at this conference, but I want to direct you to someone who does: Diary of an Anxious Black Woman. The only thing I want to add to what she's said is that I know of a couple of additional cases of men at the hotel harassing lesbian couples who were walking/talking together. Clearly, this was a white, middle-class, heterosexual environment, into which dropped NWSA.

I'd be interested to know if NWSA will follow up with a statement to the hotel of some kind, or to the St. Charles Convention and Visitor's Bureau.

In honor of the 4th of July...

...I wanted to share a Boondocks comic strip with you all.

But I couldn't find it. Anywhere. And I've been searching online for quite a while.

So here is the next best thing: a synopsis.

Huey Freeman is the older brother of the family, a quick-witted, elementary school socialist. His younger brother Riley is a self-styled gangster rapper, and the two are being raised by their traditionalist grandfather.

Huey and his family deal with yuppie neighbors, a classmate who thinks that all African Americans are either rappers or basketball players and a school principal whose idea of racial sensitivity training involves having teachers watch 1970s blaxploitation films.

The strip is frank and honest in dealing with political issues. In one installment, Riley complains about having missed the neighborhood Fourth of July barbecue. "I can’t believe Independence Day came and went and nobody told me," he says. Huey responds: "I bet millions of African slaves said the same thing a couple hundred years ago."

The visuals help, but you get the point, right?

I think I can still call myself Plain(s) Feminist...

...but I am moving to the Twin Cities, baby!

Yes, I got a job.

Yes, it is in Women's Studies.

Yes, that fact makes this post seem unnecessarily bitter, but trust me, it's really not. Just ask my adjunct or temporary-hire colleagues.

Yes, it felt awful to run into friends at the conference who had applied for the job I ended up getting. Almost, but not quite, as bad as when the situation was reversed. There is just nothing good about this job market.

Yes, the band from Minneapolis that I listened to in college is still playing gigs there, which is quite cool. (Someday, I will have to write a post about them.)

I'm going up in a few days to look for a place. Wish me luck!

Back from the National Women's Studies Conference

I didn't make it to the "sexy" sessions (Jessica Valenti, on one hand, and the Wheelock Conference folks, on the other), but there was still plenty of drama.

...

I just wrote and then deleted what would have been a really snarky and pointed paragraph. Instead, let me say this:

- If you come to a conference for the first time, instead of whinging about "where are all the panels about x" and "why is NWSA so racist/classist/etc.," you might think about why *you* didn't bother to propose a panel about x. And then propose one for next year.

- If you submit an individual paper when the directions clearly state that full panels have a better chance of being accepted, please don't mope and act surly when your paper isn't added to the session you want it to be added to. If you want to be in a paper session, then propose a full panel. This is not rocket science, people.

- Having a wedding in the same facility as the feminist conference does not oppress you. I don't care how much you hate the institution of marriage and how much you don't want to be around wedding rituals. You are in a public space, and you don't get to impose your preferences on everyone else's behavior. Deal with it.

- Complaining that the wedding is oppressing you will seriously undermine your very legitimate concerns about safety in public spaces.

- Organizers should perhaps not book feminist conferences at golf resorts that were formerly "gentlemen's clubs." I'm just saying. I think some of the safety issues and harassment were connected to the sense of what that space was and the access that gave the other guests to women's bodies.

- If you perceive the mere existence of panels that speak to the experience of mothering as a message that women should "stay home and have babies"...well, I really don't know what to say to you, other than that you clearly are not doing much in the way of listening, now, are you?

- If you perceive reasonable objections to your presentation as confrontational, then you need to consider taking a vacation next year, instead.

- If you are a resort hotel that routinely overbooks and tells its guests, "I know you think you reserved a non-smoking room, but that's really just a request and not a guarantee," you suck.

- Music by women only is a nice idea, but it is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad approach to a DJ'd dance. Please, do not do that again. And while we're on the subject, one might consider quizzing potential DJs on what constitutes danceable music. One Pointer Sister-style song is fine. Many such songs are not fine. Also, switching genres dramatically and erratically is not fine, either, which is why real DJs generally don't do it. And seriously, if you're just going to play crappy music that no one can dance to, that is not empowering to anyone. (Has no one ever heard of Alison Moyet, for pete's sake?!)


Aside from all of that, I did get to witness history in the making. The NWSA passed a resolution opposing women-born-women policies and urging feminist organizations who had such policies to rethink them. This is a huge deal, and it could not have happened five years ago. What's more, I believe that it passed unanimously, or very nearly.

OK, so seriously: I had a great time. I did. Which is why, despite my laundry list above, I never miss this conference.

I am off to argue with people I agree with...

...which means I'm going to the National Women's Studies Association conference in Chicago. Or, rather, west of Chicago. I anticipate many hours spent waiting for the NWSA shuttle to take me to the conference site. Must remember to pack knitting and a book. Sigh.

Point is, you won't be hearing from me for a few days because I will be busy conferencing. However, this is a conference that has in past years drawn folks like Mary Daly, Sheila Jeffreys, Wendy Chapkis, and other controversial feminists. So...I may return with stories.

I am off to pack. See you when I get back.