Ally as a Verb

Ally is a verb, a job description, not a self-appointed title.

I write this not only for those to want to be good allies, but to those of us in the queer community who exist along different axes of oppression and privilege.

I am aware of my privilege as a mostly white-passing person with an upper-middle class background. This privilege lends me a sense of entitlement to speak in places where my voice is unnecessary and unwelcome. I spend a lot of time interrogating that entitlement.

These are the questions I try to answer before I decide to interject myself.

Whose voices need to be heard right now? Whose voices are frequently silenced? Am I taking space away from someone with less privilege who is closer to the issue? Who actually needs to hear what I have to say?

Right now, we need to hear queer Latinx voices. We need to center this community in all conversation, make space for Latinx people to express our grief, our anger, our fear. The media wants to ignore that this was a hate crime against LGBT people. But we cannot forget that this was a hate crime against specifically POC queers. The shooter chose a night when the club would be full of young, happy, Latinx gay & trans people. Let us speak for our own pain.

And whose voices are silenced, over and over? Queer People of Color. The fight for queer justice has been brown from the beginning, but we still want to pretend a white boy threw the first brick at Stonewall.

If you feel the need to interject yourself into the conversation, will you be speaking over someone whose voice is already ignored? Are you taking time, attention or space away from a person who has been discouraged from raising their voice but desperately needs to scream? Is what you want to say more important, and why?

And who needs to hear what you have to say? Friends, family, allies, we do not need to hear what you have to say. We need to hear our own voices raised in anger, we need to hear our own screams and chants and songs. In queer spaces, we need your respectful silence.

So ask yourself, who needs to hear what you have to say? Because I guarantee, even though we don’t, there is someone in your life who does. Your voices are important, outside of queer spaces. There are So Many people who need to hear that you are angry, and sad, and will not be tolerating any more bullshit from homophobes. Your Facebook friends whose jokes you don’t laugh at but don’t call out need to hear that that shit is Not Funny and you won’t put up with it anymore. Your family member who says they ‘love the sinner but hate the sin’ needs to hear that hating the sin drove a man to murder 49 innocent people and they are complicit.

THIS IS WHERE YOU VOICE NEEDS TO BE HEARD. And that is so, so much more difficult than standing up in front of a bunch of queers and talking about how you were affected by this tragedy. Believe me, I get it. But this is why ‘ally’ isn’t a title. Without effort, without examining where you are needed, calling yourself an ally means about as much as me calling myself the Duke of Aptos.

This is the job description. This is the verb: this is how you ally yourself with the queer community.

The Love of My Life

I fell in love this semester. Deeply, head over heels, in love. From fuzzy-headed morning to late into the night, I spend all my time exihilerated, and challenged by this romance. I know that for most people, such an intimate connection would be kept exclusive, but I can't help it. I want everyone to love

Biology.

As a child, I knew what I wanted to be. Always. You ask me when I was four, I'd say “marine biologist.” You ask me when I was ten, I'd say “Marine biologist. Or maybe a seismologist.” Thirteen, fourteen? “marine biologist, or virology would be totally cool too. But all the good stuff's being done by the government, and I don't trust them.” A passion for learning has been in my blood since the beginning. A childhood nurtured with National Geographic and frequent trips to the Aquarium fostered that passion.

But life got in the way. I didn't drive off to British Columbia when I graduated high school, fully prepared to rescue baby killer whales with my 4X4, Free Willy style. I didn't even graduate. Instead, I cared for my dying mother, and then spent the next 8 years or so trying to pick up the pieces.

I went back to school. Got bogged down in math, which has always been my nemesis. Decided that I could love biology from afar, admire it as a layperson, and switched to major in creative writing instead. No more likely to make me a living wage, but something I could, with some effort, be good at. It was, and I hope I can say this without sounding egotistical, safe.

Something was missing though. I would watch Youtube videos of deep sea creatures, and harangue Kenny for as long as he'd listen about what we know-and how much we don't know. And he'd look at me and say “you light up when you talk about this. Why aren't you studying biology?”

It was scary. Math was scary. Even scarier though was the prospect of succeeding, and then realizing that I had been wrong. When so much of your self-identification is based on this label-Marine Biologist In the Making-what happens if you find out you don't like it? Far safer to write. Teach writing. Watch video of ROVs descending the Monterey Canyon and sigh quietly. It was way too scary to think about attempting.

I did it anyway. This fall I enrolled in Calculus, Chemistry, and Biology 22. Three of the core classes I'll need when I transfer (all fingers crossed) to UCSC next fall, with a marine biology major.

Calculus was hard. Though I'd enjoyed pre-calc, (math! For the first time in my life!) and felt good going in, it was a slog all the way through. Chemistry I felt solid in. I'd taken chemistry before and had a good handle on it. It was a lot of work, no doubt, but I didn't feel any different coming out than I did going in.

Biology on the other hand. Well, biology changed everything. Bio 22 is, as our instructors made clear on the first day, a majors bio class. That means that everyone in the room, for one reason or another, was a biology major. It was (for the most part) like coming home to a family I didn't know I had. I fit (again, for the most part). I learned, and questioned, and absorbed more knowledge than I'd ever had access to before. My curiosity was piqued more times, and on more diverse subjects, than ever before. It became a joke among my friends in the class that whatever we were learning that week would surely be what I wanted to do research on later. Of course deep sea jellies! Of course dinoflagellates!

I'd always been a big predator kind of girl. But every week there was a new question, a new vein of inquiry that I wanted to follow. From evolution to plants to invertebrates, it all fascinated me. And every piece that I learned made me see the world in a clearer way. This is the only way I've been able to describe it:

Imagine you're looking at the muddy bank of a river. All you can see is the water, some trees on the far shore, and the mud at your feet. That's all that's there for your eyes to focus on. But beneath that, there are predator/prey interactions. There are all kinds of different plants among those trees, with wildly different heritages and abilities. There are microscopic organisms floating in the water. There are sediments being carried by the water that tell a story we can't see.

And each of those elements: the predators, the prey, the plants and the sediment; they all tantalize me with questions.

It was good to be around people who understood. After all, that's why most of us were in the class: we have questions. But being curious doesn't make someone a scientist. It's just a really good place to start. I still wondered if I really wanted to do Science, or if I just wanted to sit in a classroom all day hearing someone talk about amazing things. There's only one way to know for sure.

For the last two weeks of the class, we designed our own experiments, based what we'd learned this semester, and what interested us. We wrote a hypothesis. The hypothesis was tested with tools we'd learned how to use this semester. We looked at our data and formed conclusions. Then each group presented their findings to the class. When I write it out like this, it sounds silly. 8^th graders do science projects. But it wasn't silly.

My friends and I were curious about the biodiversity of a man-made substrate versus biodiversity of the naturally occurring rock. It turned out our hypothesis was correct, and the biodiversity of the man-made substrate was significantly lower. That was-to me at least-utterly irrelevant. The process of questioning, hypothesizing, and designing an experiment was far more valuable. I waded out to do a count on the wall at Lover's Point (and got dunked in the process), then came back and entered our numbers into a couple different biodiversity calculators. I took the raw numbers that we had scribbled in our damp notebooks, and made them tell me things. The things they told me weren't earth-shattering by any means, but they provoked more lines of inquiry. Each question leads to another...

After each group had presented their study, our instructor congratulated us on having done Science. I wish I could remember his exact words. It was something to the effect of “many of you have wanted to be scientists, but your understanding of what that means comes from nature shows. This is what science is.”

Those words sank into me like a warm drop of truth right through my breastbone. I'd been wondering myself if I truly wanted to be a scientist, or if I wanted to be the star of my own exciting nature program. Now I know.

I want to be a scientist.

Our experiment wasn't glamorous. It wasn't exciting, except when I fell in. And it wasn't particularly thrilling when I pulled together the numbers and started to draw conclusions. It just felt right. It felt like loving someone: good, and so natural you don't notice right away, even though the whole world is changed. The 'aha' moment didn't come until after he made that comment.

This is what I want to do. Over and over. Every day.

I don't want a nature show. I want to ask questions, and get answers. I want to go out, get data, and make it tell me things.

So that's the story of how I fell in love over fall semester. I can't wait for Bio 21 in the spring!

Something Important

 I got two movie tickets from my awesome employer for my work during the summer, and Kenny and I had been lightheartedly bickering over what to go see for several days. I wanted to indulge my feminine side and go see the romantic drama “The Words.” He wanted to check out the mobster-and -guns flick “Lawless.”

Now never let it be said that I don't enjoy a mobster movie. Period mobster movies, even more so. The tommy guns, the awesome suits. The slang. So, what the hell. More than likely “The Words” will bore me to tears anyway.

So after school today, he picked me up and we headed over to Del Monte to see our free movie, expecting no more than mostly brainless shoot 'em up entertainment in period costume.

As I am writing this, I can still feel my heart racing with anger. I've calmed down considerably since we left the theater. Then I felt like King Kong, wanting to climb the highest tower and scream wordless rage while batting agressors down like flies.

********

I've learned a lot about our culture recently. I've had to re-evaluate a lot of what I thought I knew, and what I thought was 'normal', and 'culturally acceptable.' Had to evaluate whether either of those things actually meant 'healthy', or even 'sane.'

I had to allow myself to think, and eventually even say out loud, words like 'rape culture.'

You don't believe rape culture exists?

You don't think both men and women are enculturated to believe our perverse relationship with gender and sex is normal?

You're not looking close enough. As the saying goes, “if you're not angry, you're not paying attention.”

I wasn't paying attention. I worked goddamn hard to not pay attention. Phrases like “rape culture” used to embarrass me, that these otherwise intelligent folks were focusing So Hard on something nonexistent. There are wars being fought! Crooked presidents to vote out of office! Economies to fix! Focus your liberal, open-minded, forward-thinking intellect on something IMPORTANT, dammit!

I didn't want to see it. I didn't want to aknowledge that so much of the media we consume, the conversations we have, our perceptions of ourselves and those around us, can be colored-tainted-by this warped lense we're looking through.

I thought that my relationship with fear and anger, and my inexplicable feelings of powerlessness were unique to my own messed up head. I thought I was the only one who immediately sized up strangers approaching me on the street. The only one watching all the alleys and doorways when I walked alone. The only one secretly and silently rage-filled that such anxiety was necessary, even praised. I thought I was the only one who seethed at the double standard around me.

I'm not the only one.

I'm not alone here.

And somehow that realization was worse. Because if it's not just my paranoia, if there's no talk therapy or psychotropic drug to make the anger and the powerlessness go away, if the culture-our culture-itself is sick, then everybody's swimming in this mess.

A lot more women than me are living with constant, low-grade anxiety. An awareness of vulnerability.

I find ways to decline dates without ever saying “No. I don't want to.” because it feels dangerous. Let him save face. Be polite. Be vague. Make excuses. Don't assert yourself.

I don't assert differing opinions, I don't argue or push a point when I know I'm right, unless I know the man well. Unless I feel safe.

This is the culture we're swimming in. It's exhausting.

So tonight, I took Kenny out to see a fun movie.

I suppose I should give some kind of spoiler alert, in case anyone is interested in seeing this piece of shit, so there you go. Spoilers.

During the course of the film, two women are raped. Both off screen.

Implied sexual violence, you could call it.

Up until the point of the first rape, the lead actress had been nothing more than window dressing.

She returned to being window dressing as soon as the plot lumbered forward. Forward to more important things, like the lead man getting revenge for almost being killed. The only sop we're given after the scene is a startling, momentary image: the female lead wiping away tears and putting herself together in the mirror at the hospital. Bruises in the shape of a hand cover her shoulder.

But she's not in the hospital for her own injuries. She's there because the leading man is there, recovering from a slit throat.

Leading lady continues to have absolutely no impact on the plot, to the point where she actually has no lines beyond emotionally calling co-leading man's name as he storms out to get revenge for someone's murder.

Get it? The rape, the anonymous-and-never-dealt-with rapists, the woman herself were completely inconsequential to the plot.

The second rape is again, implied. The antagonist has been clearly portrayed as creepy. We get it. The slicked back, neatly trimmed hair, the leather gloves, the fastidious nature, we get it. Creepy with an undercurrent of undisclosed horrific sexual perversity. Well acted. Well portrayed.

I didn't need to see the young black woman sitting naked on the edge of his bed. Sitting on spread newspapers, crying, while he neatly donned his kid gloves and quoted the Bible.

And, in case you were wondering, she never apears again. She didn't have a name. Her only lines were sobs.

Somehow this was important to the story.

There is a term in cinema and television, “kicking the puppy;” which is derived from the idea that if you need to quickly show just how evil the bad guy is, you have him kick a puppy.

Apparently this doesn't cut it anymore. Now the trope is “raping the woman.”

Sexual violence against women is shown as shorthand for how heinously evil the bad guy is. It's used as a plot device for the male lead to seek revenge against the rapist. It's an excuse, it's a diversion, it's an easy way to up the ante. You don't even have to go all out and rape someone. Imply the threat of sexual violence. Make sure your audience knows what's on the table. What the stakes are, if the (usually male) lead should fail.

Here's my rule: If you're not the one who was raped, It's Not Your Story.

You want to tell another story, one without gratuitous sexual violence? Great! I can't wait to watch.

But the instant you use sexual violence to further the plot of a male-centered story, or somehow even more disgustingly, use it to pointlessly fill running time, I'm done.

I don't give a shit about the asshole brothers who run moonshine and tangle with the law. They are No Longer Important to me.

I care about the woman with the hand shaped bruises on her shoulder. I care about the anonymous woman sobbing on the newspapers. You can't tell me “oh, this happened too, but now we're going back to the Important Stuff like dipshits shooting each other.”

Because when you do that, you're telling me; me and everyone one else in that goddamn theater that women being raped is not Important Stuff.

It's just the subplot. It's just...filler.

They adjusted their makeup and fixed their hair and went on with their lives, because the Important Stuff was happening somewhere else. Men were killing each other over alcohol, and the alcohol was a far more precious commodity at the time. The women were worthless.

They didn't mean anything.

The rapes didn't mean anything.

It was all just filler until something important came along.

Defined in Retrospect

Film Noir is one of those classic genres of cinema that is almost instantly recognizable. We know what we're getting ourselves into as soon as the lights go down. The lighting, the framing, the high contrast between light and dark, the imagery and subject matter all cue us: we're watching a noir movie.
But according my my cinema teacher, at the time these films were made, no one went to the studio and said "I want to make a film noir." The genre is something we have applied in retrospect to a group of films made in a certain time, with certain techniques, to fit prevailing tastes. Now we can see these similarities and group them under the heading "Noir." At the time, people were just going about making good movies.

When I was little, my mom would tuck me in every night. She'd come lie down with me and we'd talk about the day. That was our time to reflect on things that we'd learned, on things that were bothering me, but I hadn't been courageous enough to bring up in the day time, or in public. It was in these times that she taught me how to cleanse my energy and calm myself, as well. I don't remember when we stopped doing that, but I have a very clear memory of the night when I realized, as I was putting myself to bed, that she'd stopped tucking me in. And even then, I couldn't recall when it had happened. The transition itself had been imperceptible. It was only upon reflection that I realized things had changed.

I'd be willing to bet that most people were afraid of some kind of monsters as children. And most of us hid under our blankets. We devised ways to encase ourselves entirely in the safety of the comforter, leaving only a tiny opening to breathe through.
And then, at some point, we stopped. At some point I stopped sleeping under my pillow. I no longer lie awake wondering if Communion-style grays (I have an alien problem) are staring impassively at me through the window. But I don't remember when that fear left me. Burying my head under blankets and pillows used to be a fool-proof way to protect myself against whatever horror I'd either invented, read about, or just watched on TV. But no matter how hard I try, I can't pin down when that ended.

At a party last week I met a stranger who had known someone I went to high school with. When I was a freshman, this mutual acquaintance had been a senior, and I have distinct memories of how mature and sophisticated this guy was. I mean, he was a senior. In my mind, he'd been a grown up, while I was still a goofy kid.
As the conversation turned, I sat back for a moment and realized that I am 10 years older than he had been when I knew him. So in retrospect I can say that of course he didn't have his shit together, he was an 18 year old kid himself.

A few months ago I read K an old poem I'd written a while back. It was about the nights when I'd lie awake, battling my demons and trying to stay sane until daylight or sleep came. In it, I said that someday I would read this to a lover, and it would be difficult for him or her to understand, because in that future someday I'd be sleeping peacefully through the night.
Reading that poem to K, I started crying. I had forgotten about those nights. Somewhere along the way, I had made my peace with night time. And looking back, I can't recall when those nightly battles ended.

So many transitions in my life can only be seen when looking backwards. They are often trends that I don't notice until I look over my shoulder and think "when did that change?" But because the change was slow, consisting of many pieces adding up over the course of months or years, there can be no fixed moment to point at.

 I'm beginning to think that that's what growing up is about. We struggle and work on ourselves, on our goals and relationships, and enormous change rarely happens overnight. "Yesterday I was insecure, possessive, and had trust issues. Today I am confident, self-assured, and able to trust the people who deserve it." That sounds great. But it doesn't happen that way. Today I am insecure and possessive. Tomorrow hopefully I'll be slightly less so. The day after I might be a bit more, because progress isn't a simple line graph. It's waves on a beach, coming in, going out, but each one on average a little higher than previous waves.
Someday I will be confident. I will be free of possessiveness, and I will be able to trust those who have earned it. But I won't be able to see such monumental change while I'm in the middle of it.
Like film noir, these transitions can only be defined in retrospect.

The Epic Door Knob Saga

I'm an only child, so when the time came for my father to teach his son how to use a hammer or build a dangerous contraption capable of bodily harm, he had to make do with me. And I like to think I learned the general principles of most DIY'ers. #1: Have lots of tools. #2: Why would you read the instructions? #3: Swear fluently when it goes wrong. And #4, the real kicker, the one that makes the other three work: Know how to improvise and work through trouble to achieve your desired outcome. Let's all take a moment and acknowledge my dad, who painstakingly taught his daughter these valuable lessons, including the bonus lesson "Don't use a sledgehammer while wearing flipflops."  Thanks, Dad.
So when I noticed that the door knob on my bedroom door was covered in masking tape, and my new roomie explained that it needed to be replaced, I offered to do it. After all, it's a simple thing I've done before, it's something that will bring me satisfaction from working with my hands, and it will keep my mind occupied, something else quite valuable right now. She looked at me like I was crazy, but acquiesced.
Day 1.
I knew I would need a new door knob. That seemed self-evident. To the hardware store! A cheap but lockable door knob is $6.99, no great price to pay for the healthy boost in self respect I was expecting when I opened and closed the door for the first time. (You know, when you finish a project, and stand back to admire what you've done, no matter how insignificant?) Of course, the package said I would need a Phillips screwdriver. And then it hit me.
I have no tools. Wait, no, what?
I have no tools! WTF? Whose daughter? Not even a goddamned screwdriver?
Not a single solitary goddamn screwdriver.
When I left Washington state, I left behind much of my old life (including, apparently, my toolbox). When I was living with my family, I had no need to replenish my toolkit, because most of the people I'm related to collect tools the way gravity collects...everything. Which meant that whatever tool I needed could probably be found with enough vigorous searching.
Then I moved in with K. K is a motorcycle mechanic, and shares my family's gravitational theory of tools. When we found an ad on Craigslist for Makita power tools, he crowed for days. Honestly, if we'd had a bigger bed he might have slept with the damn thing, like a kid with his favorite Christmas gift. So again, if I needed a tool, all I had to do was reach into his magical bag, hunt around for a couple minutes, and return victorious. I swore I was going to help him organize that someday.
Sigh.
Anyway, back at the hardware store, I realized I would need to buy myself a screwdriver. So, feeling like the noobiest noob in the store, I sidled on over to a clerk and asked where their tool section is. Have you ever had to ask where the screwdrivers are, in a hardware store? I felt like I'd walked into a grocery store and asked where they keep "that tasty stuff that keeps me from passing out-you know, you put it in your mouth and move your jaw up and down a lot?" But the young man obliged. A little too obligingly, he really wanted to stay and help me pick a screwdriver. Dude. It's a screwdriver! I grabbed the cheap one and split.
And thus I returned home triumphant, ready to wrest more self esteem out of an inanimate object. I set down my new knob, my midget screwdriver (the cheapest one was called the Stubby. This actually does affect the plot here), and faced my foe for the first time. Whereupon I noticed that, though my shiny new knob takes Phillips screws, my ugly old one takes...flatheads.
**Intermission, while I bang my head against the wall**
Day 2.
I'd been running back and forth all week from one store to another, trying to find the cheapest ways to stock a new house with the basic items that I take for  granted. Target was all out of cheap flathead screwdrivers, so I walked across the street, back to the OSH where I'd gotten the Phillips. Ah, but this time, I knew where the hand tools were. Improvement! I grabbed the cheap one again, though this one is regular sized, and came home to finish my battle. The old door knob came out with a little wrangling, using the longer screwdriver as leverage. I pulled out the new one's hardware, and fitted the inside part to the hole in the door.
It didn't fit. Whether the wood had simply swollen with age, or standard sizes had changed in the 3,000 years since the house had been built, I don't know. It almost fit. So close! But there was no way I could make it work, given my current circumstances. If only I'd had a hammer to tap it into place with...
**Intermission 2, while I stare at my handiwork and cry**
Later on Day 2, my new roomie, A, offered to loan me her hammer. Gratefully, I accepted. Taking a careful look in the instructions to see which way the tongue/latch is supposed to face (I know, this is where I went wrong, huh? I totally violated the rules!), I smacked  the thing into place. Beautiful! The knob went on, and I screwed it in. Even realizing that "stubby" is not a good thing for a screwdriver to be couldn't dampen my zeal. So what if the handle of the screwdriver is right up against the door handle itself and makes it 10x harder to use! It's working! At last, I tightened the final screw and sat back on my heels, ready to soak in that hard-earned pride. I closed the door. But instead of that beautiful little 'snick' of the latch I'd been expecting, I got a 'thunk'.
The tongue comes out the wrong way. Instead of sliding smoothly into the socket in the wall, it smacks against it. I installed it backwards. I. Installed. The goddamn door knob. Backwards.
And that brings us to this morning, where I sit in bed, staring at my quiet, smug little door knob. Soon I will have the patience and time to unscrew all those tedious little pieces, with my freaking annoying little Stubby screwdriver, find some way to leverage the thing out and turn it around, then hammer it back in, check to make sure I've got it right this time, then screw the thing down like the wrath of God.
I'd like to say there's some meaningful lesson behind this tirade, some kernel of wisdom I wanted to impart. But there isn't. This time it's just a frustrating story that I found amusing. Though, if I were to really dig, I suppose the moral of the story is that every woman needs her tools. Lots of them.

The Silver Lining Mining Co.

This morning marks the second day I've woken up in my new home. It's... not bad. There were no tears last night, nor the night before. I expected tears. I expected to cry myself to sleep, sobbing into my pillow quietly for fear of waking my new roommate.
That didn't happen, and I honestly feel guilty about it. Part of me believes there should have been tears. And there have been, believe me, many times in the past 10 days when I have simply stopped what I was doing and cried. But not here. Maybe it's because by the time I get in at night I'm exhausted, and I know how to make myself sleep quickly. Or maybe it's because I feel at home here. More traitorous "accepting the situation" bullshit. After all, if I can make myself happy here, then I can internalize the fact that this is not temporary. If I start to feather my own nest, and make myself happy by myself, I'm not waiting-or subconsciously expecting-K to call me and ask me to come 'home'.
Traitorous indeed.
But I do like my new place. Despite its drawbacks (thrown into bright, glaring detail when compared with my old home with K), it's charming. Up the hill, away from the cold and wet air by the ocean, but still in PG, this house has just about everything I need. It's old, uninsulated, the windows are single-pane, and apparently the walls are very thin. A, my new roomie, warned me that I'd be able to hear the TV, people talking, music, etc. What she wasn't able to warn me about is the thundering quiet I experienced going from sharing a room with another person to living by myself. She gets up around 5:30, is out by 7ish. I wake up around 8. She's home and in her room when I get home. She leaves me notes about what goes where, and yesterday there was a note with a bag of day-old pastries and some fruit she couldn't eat. So dinner was strawberries. And I'm not complaining, because I'm not looking to do girl-talk bonding with anybody right now. I'm glad of the space to think. It's just odd to think of how many less words I'm using daily, simply by virtue of not having anyone around the house.

**That's another odd thing about no longer living together. Permit me the digression, but I took K to Target day before yesterday. Since he doesn't have a car, if I'm going somewhere I'll sometimes offer him a ride. I found myself yakking his ear off on the trip over, and stopped myself. It felt weird. It wasn't nervous chatter, I wasn't hiding a feeling of discomfort. I simply had so much to say. I hadn't had a chance to engage with him in a while. Naturally, a lot of our conversations lately have been centered on how we're handling the situation. On Wednesday, I felt okay, and I wanted to talk to my friend. So I did. And I realized how much I had to say because we hadn't just gabbed in a week.
All the little things you see or experience in your day, the neat articles or stories from your professors, when you get home, you share with your partner. Like filling up a bucket with seashells while you're at the beach, and bringing them home to spill out on the counter for your partner to enjoy. But that's not how it works anymore.**

Anyway. I like my room, quiet though it is. My classes end at 2 today, so I'll come back here and start to put stuff away. And I'm looking forward to that. There's nobody here to say "I like it when the dresser is over here, and the 'whatever' goes there." I'm setting up shop the way I like it, and I don't have to appease anybody else's sensibilities. Gotta find those silver linings.
One of the biggest realizations I've had since last Tuesday is how to value myself. I know this seems like a non sequitur, but bear with me.
I've had low self-esteem for a while. I recognized it, but didn't know what to do. Possibly I didn't care. Doesn't matter. I didn't value myself as I should have. "What do I do" the thought would go "that is valuable?"
Since K and I split last Tuesday, I have found myself a new home, signed a lease, moved my shit, paid my bills, gone to work and done my schoolwork. I value myself because even though I'm in pain, even though sometimes I wish I could turn back time and erase everything that's happened since the night of the 13th, I'm still going. And all the things we did together, which were difficult, I'm doing by myself, often for the first time in my sheltered 28 years.
I value my strength. I value that I'm still laughing, and crying when the occasion warrants it. I value what sometimes feels like phantom limb pain, when I reach out to touch a relationship that no longer exists.
I think I can be happy here, in this room in PG. I've always been fiercely independent, and this room is a reminder of what I can accomplish, all by my self. It is, if I'm honest, rather exhilarating.

I realized that a lot was going on in my little world that I wanted to share, and explore in text, and have a permanent record of, and not overwhelm my Facebook feed. So I started a blog. I'd been thinking about doing this for a while, but it seemed unnecessary. I didn't feel like I had a lot to say. But things change. Huge life changes happen, and I get to thinking, and hopefully something good will come out of this whole process.
But not all my FB friends need my meandering, maundering, sometimes maudlin screeds clogging up their feeds. Those of you who are interested are welcome to take a peek occasionally, or comment if I get too involved in self-pitying. Or, ya know, whatever. Here we go.
My partner and I split up on the 14th. We'd been together about a year. We had plans. We love(ed?) each other. But that's not what this blog is-mostly-about.
I have never lived by myself. I've been married, I lived with my husband for several years. I lived with my most recent partner for almost 10 months. But I've never done this grown up shit by myself. And I am, quite frankly, terrified.
So I'm writing this. It's a log of my mysterious voyage into (dun dun dun) Adulthood.
How do we define ourselves as adults? Where is the threshold, and who gets to decide when we've passed it?
Hopefully this blog will be a record of my attempts-failed, successful, and ongoing-at convincing myself and others that I've breached the Adult Threshold. And because I have been making these attempts in concert with a partner, up until 2 weeks ago, there may be a fair amount of "wow this is different when I'm lonely/single" navel gazing.
But I promise to steer clear of as much self-indulgent emo-ness as is humanly possible.
That about wraps it up for tonight.