The Mama Bear on the Ceiling

I cant exactly say when I first noticed the mama bear on the ceiling of my parents bedroom. Whether it was when I was really small and occupied that bedroom with them or later when I was just plain small and my mother was dying. Perhaps it was sometime in between. Whichever it was I did notice her, the mama bear on the ceiling.

I think the first time I paid her (the mama bear on the ceiling) any real mind was the first time my ma went into hospital. I didnt know why she went, I was told nothing. I only knew she was gone and I wanted her back. From the first night she was gone, my dad slept on the couch. He couldn't sleep in their bed without her. From the first night she was gone, I slept alone in their bed, because I couldn't sleep anywhere else. Each morning I slept in that bed, I awoke to the mama bear on the ceiling.

She of course wasn't a real bear, she was actually a water spot that my dad had painted over several times, and each time, she bled through refusing to leave. I remember staring and staring at her, wondering what her life was like. I knew she was a mama bear because she looked like a bear, kinda a teddy bear who was standing at a stove cooking, with a small baby bear standing beside her. She also had on an apron, so I knew she couldn't be a daddy bear. My dad always cooked on weekends, when he didnt work, and I never once remember him wearing an apron. I used to love when he made waffles. He made the best waffles ever! To be honest I've never tasted a waffle since. He is dead now too and out of my insane sense of morality I would never even try another waffle since it would be a waffle he didnt make. So yeah, the apron, the baby, the stove, the cooking, she was a mama bear. And because she was cooking for her baby, I knew she was a loving mama bear.

Sometime after my ma got out of hospital and everything was okay again, per usual we went "up north". We had a cabin a few hours north of where I grew up. It was a small red cabin trimmed in white, planted on three lots. My dad put in indoor plumbing so we would have a toilet and running water. When we first got the cabin we had an out house behind the cabin, painted red also and also trimmed in white. We had a water pump in front of the cabin. I have vague memories of enjoying using that old water pump, I thought it was right neato! Much more neat I thought than just turning on the tap. The outhouse however I could have done without! Spiders!!!!!

The cabin was located in this tiny tiny town called Dodge City, which was replicated to look like Dodge City. The small main strip was old western. Even had the places where you could tie your horse up, even though you rarely saw a horse. Our cabin was nearly right across from the main town strip. I loved running over to the local store there, Kernes, and getting candy. They had different candy than the stores I was used to. They also had, down the road from us a fancy gift shop which seemed out of place there. Everything there was rustic, indian, cowboy except this fancy gift shop with the lady owner. I never liked her, could tell straight away she didnt like kids. I remember she wore glasses, I think they made her seem even more brusque.

I went in there the friday we arrived and right off I saw this solid rubber bear! It was her. The mama bear on the ceiling! I wanted to buy it soooo bad! I had a whole dollar. I was quite spoiled then, I usually was given a dollar every day we were at the cabin. A lot of money for a 5 y/o old at the time. The year before that my dad bought me a red mini bike which he fashioned himself with training wheels! But I was five now and could ride it without. My brother had a dirt bike and a BB gun. We were both pretty spoiled. I checked the price of the mama bear, THREE DOLLARS!!! I felt a punch in my stomach, then my mind raced forward to comfort me with the idea that if I dont spend any money I would have enough sunday to buy the bear before we left to go back home. I calmed down. I had a plan.

Sunday came and I drove my little red mini bike down to the fancy gift shop to buy the mama bear. I was so excited and so happy. I took the bear back to our cabin and gave it to my ma. She seemed perplexed for a brief second, then said that it was so nice she was going to put it on the small shadow box that hung in the living room of the cabin along with her antique knickknacks. I felt very proud. We went back to my home town where my mother would die of cancer about six months later.

I dont know whatever became of the mama bear on the ceiling, nor the rubber mama bear I bought my ma. Which btw was the ONLY thing I ever bought my ma. They, like her exist now, only in my mind, except for where they now exist here, on the page.

dirt

The Trans Community and Misogyny

In the last week I have read in two different "trans" lists (one an "academic" list btw) what amounts to "misogyny" being described as a "myth"!!! Both lists are made up of Mtf men and the females of men aka ftM women. Not so surprisingly in both lists dozens of the foM exclaimed how much they "love women", while a couple of Mtf men mentioned they couldnt be "misogynists" either because they want so much to "be women".

If you have ever questioned the authenticity and severity of misogyny which exists under all patriarchal systems, one merely has to look to the "trans" community for verifiable proof!!!! The simple truth is, if misogyny did not exist, there would be no "trans" community. Granted, subtracting misogyny wouldn't subtract the multitude of other disorders the general "trans" person suffers, but it would guarantee the "trans" disorder wouldn't be among them.

Hell, from the vantage point of women alone, how can one remotely hypothesize misogyny as a "myth" when this very second women professionals are issuing prescription drugs and surgeries aimed and fired at the complete destruction of women and women's bodies? When there are large communities created for the sole purpose of destroying women and women's bodies? When there are women "supporting" the destruction of other women and other women's bodies? And worst of all these "supporters" are the women so deluded into believing what they are "supporting" is the "choice" other women are making about there bodies through feminism!!!! WHA?? Where the hell are the true feminist who would be fighting tooth and nail for the lives, body and soul of these victimized women? And victims they are, victims of patriarchy so steeped and entrenched in their own pathological self hatred, they seek total obliteration of their female lives/bodies.

No women who destroys herself as a women, who supports in any way, shape or form the destruction of another women or who does nothing while women are being destroyed or are destroying themselves can truly say and mean they "love women"! If you cannot love yourself as a woman, you can NEVER truly love another women!

I am a women
I love myself
I love women

dirt

Baby Butch Bathroom Shame

Butch invisibility has guaranteed that Butch women have to deal with various levels of harassment and embarrassment through their being ignorantly mistaken for men by other women whenever they use public ladies rooms. Whether it is as minor as a women walking into the ladies room seeing a Butch woman washing her hands, then going back out to verify she is in the right bathroom, to the down right rude and nastiness of some women screaming at said Butches to "get out" or "there is a man in the ladies" and getting a manager. Public bathroom issues are par for the course for Butch women, we may not like them, but as adults we deal with them. Some days they evoke in us anger, same days shame. While it would be easy enough to devote a whole post to this, (and I may later) I am going to instead write a bit about my feelings and experiences of when this issue first began for me.

Its interesting to see how early girls begin internalizing misogyny, especially baby Butches.

Not surprisingly my first experience with using a public bathroom was also my first experience in shame. It was kindergarten. The first day. Part way through the half morning class we were given a snack and a pint of white milk. After everyone had finished we were directed to line up in front of the girls and boys bathrooms which were located within the classroom. I suddenly felt sick to my stomach at the very thought of having to stand in the "girls" line. I hesitated, waited until all the other girls lined up, then stood behind them. Granted, I had no desire to stand with the boys either, but I still felt sickened and ashamed of having to stand with the girls, in the girls line. It was literally like a kick in the gut to feel I was a girl. I knew I was a girl alright, but knowing doesn't quite register the way feeling does. I was okay knowing it, I wanted to die feeling it. From then on, I did everything in my power to hold it till I got home. Even skipped drinking the milk, not that that was too difficult as I hated milk....lol

So began my pattern of bathroom shame. In first, second and third grade which I went to at the the same school as kindergarten, I simply held it till lunch (went home for lunch), then held it again till I went home after school. It became a regular worry, which honestly lasted until the day I dropped out of high school in grade 12. Worry and shame. Worry and shame. Worry and shame. I find my adult self grieving the pain, suffering and shame my younger selves lived, not through, but with, everyday. My 5 year old self, my 12 year old self, my 19 years old self, and on and on, were all shamed because nowhere could they look, no direction known to MAN reflected them back to themselves in any manner! So shame became the natural outcome to my Butch invisibility.

The sad thing is, it isn't even men who failed me, men fail women with every breath taken, its the women who failed my baby Butch self! Failed to create a space for me, failed show me how truly powerful they are to my shamed filled budding Butch self. Failed to show me they are more than a piece of meat to be sucked dry by men, failed to show me they are not defined by men, failed to show me there isn't as single way to be a woman, failed to show me the backseat they take to men is truly the drivers seat, failed to show me brains and brawn were within my reach, failed, failed, failed and still failing!

I no longer feel ashamed of being a woman, I do however feel a deep burden every time I am "sir'd" because for every "sir" I receive there is a baby Butch somewhere reeling from the very same shame that had assailed me for so very many many years. If I'm invisible, she is invisible and ashamed, with no language or potential to understand her shame. I am invisible in the light, she is ashamed and alone in the dark.

Stop Butch invisibility

Stop Butch shame

See me, see her, see us!

dirt