Bullying: Prologue

There’s been a lot of discussion in recent years about the effect of bullying on kids. I don’t know whether it’s gotten any worse since I was a kid. I do know its consequences have become more apparent, forcing adults to pay more attention to it and make a better effort to intervene when they see it happening. The issue has come up again on my Facebook timeline because a 15-year-old boy in my dad’s hometown committed suicide last month, citing bullying as the reason.

Beginning when I was 7, and continuing for the better end of a decade, I endured near-constant ridicule by my peers.

I don’t think it occurred to me at the time that I was being bullied. In the ’80s and early ’90s, a bully was someone who shoved you down or beat you up. People who called you names weren’t bullies; they were just a pain in the ass. (As a society, we took a while to figure out that sometimes a pain in the ass is a serious injury.)

Admittedly, my ugly-duckling phase was spectacular by any metric, and asking a bunch of immature brats to overlook it would have been a wholly unrealistic request — but regardless of the relative accuracy of their comments, my peers’ tactless behavior left scars, some of which I’m just discovering 20 or 30 years later.

For instance:

I am desperately uncomfortable in social settings that involve large groups.

I rarely trust people when they compliment my appearance — and if I do believe them, my first instinct is to deflect the praise.

I have an extremely self-deprecating sense of humor.

I don’t dance.

I cuss like a sonofabitch.

I would rather chew off my own leg than let anybody see my tears.

That last bit is why I am not particularly looking forward to the project I’m about to do.

Over the next few weeks, I’m going to take a closer look at each of these battle scars — partly to satisfy my own curiosity about the shapes they took, but mostly because I’m sick of hearing about kids closing the book before they get to the good parts, and if the story of how I survived a decade of verbal attacks and grew up to have the world by the tail can keep even one kid from killing himself over somebody else’s bullsh*t, then I need to suck it up and tell that story, even if it means giving up some secrets I’d rather keep.

Stay tuned. We’re finna kill some dragons.

Emily

Debunking the Beauty Myth

I’m sure by now you’re aware of the latest and most egregious attack on teenage girls’ already fragile self-esteem, but just in case you’re not, click here to find out why you’ll be boycotting Abercrombie & Fitch and its affiliates from now until the Cubs win the Series.

As much as I’d love to believe that the inevitable demise of Mike Jeffries’ career will solve the problem, the sad fact is that it probably won’t; all this hypocritical P.R.-nightmare-in-flip-flops has done for us is put a comically clueless face on a much larger issue.

Jeffries’ tone-deaf misogyny harmonizes perfectly with the other sour notes I’ve heard lately: Disney’s gratuitous attempt to sexualize Merida from Brave; InTouch’s apparent ignorance of biology; the frequent attacks on Hillary Clinton’s appearance; and the ridicule a young friend of mine endures on a daily basis because she is albino and thus has a porcelain complexion, green eyes, and gorgeous golden-red dreadlocks to go with her African-American features.

Jeffries may have articulated it the most brazenly, but his message is no different than the others’: If you are female, your value depends entirely on the extent to which your physical appearance adheres to a narrow set of standards engineered by ad executives for the specific purpose of making the largest possible number of women feel insecure enough about their appearance to want to spend money to change it.

This kind of manipulative marketing is detrimental to women because it seeks to profit at the expense of our self-worth. It’s detrimental to all of us — men and women alike — because it seeks to remove variables such as individual taste and force us to evaluate beauty exclusively on Madison Avenue’s flawed, self-serving rubric.

I remember a comment someone once made about my favorite singer: “Judy Collins isn’t pretty, but she’s striking.”

I disagree with the first half of that assessment, but I think it illustrates the difficulty we have in wrapping our heads around the sort of beauty that doesn’t fit the rubric. If a woman is not conventionally pretty, we don’t know what to do with her. We can’t resist looking at her, but why?

You probably don’t fit the rubric, either. And you’re in awesome company, because you know who else doesn’t fit the rubric? Adele. Queen Latifah. Emmylou Harris. Bonnie Raitt. Jamie Lee Curtis. Helen Mirren. Tina Turner. My albino friend with the stunning African-American features and Irish coloring. Me. Not one of us fits the rubric. We’re all either too old, too heavy, too unconventional, or too all of the above to meet the standards A&F is promoting.

To hell with the rubric. I’d sooner die than swap my tangled curls, gray streak, hips, boobs, laugh lines, bifocals, or self-respect for some manipulative retailer’s approval.

To quote Bette Midler (who doesn’t fit the rubric, either): “Cherish forever what makes you unique, ’cause you’re really a yawn if it goes.”

Emily

Madison

Today was glorious — chilly and drizzly, but just right for a trip to Makanda to wander through Dave Dardis’ secret garden. Dave has put in a new gallery next to Rainmaker Studio to display his work, and it’s really nice. A precocious fourth-grader named Madison, who apparently is a frequent flyer on the Boardwalk, decided I needed a guided tour.

You have not lived until you have experienced the Makanda Boardwalk through the eyes of a little girl with a big imagination. What an awesome place for a kid to hang out.

Madison and I had a very artsy, creative conversation that I am pretty sure inspired both of us. She has been studying Greek mythology at school, and she thought one of Dave’s sculptures — a woodcarving of a woman’s face with little brass people scurrying over it — represented Mother Earth and her children. Can you imagine? Fourth grade, and she’s already looking at esoteric sculptures and expounding on their underlying symbolism. As an old scholar bowl coach, the first thing I thought was, “Somebody needs to put this kid on a buzzer.” But when I suggested that she try out for her school’s team in a few years, she said she didn’t think she could do something like that, because she was in special ed.

Do I have to tell you what Mama Bear thought about whoever put that idea in this child’s head?

I assured her that I had known some awesome players who were in special ed, and if she thought something sounded like fun, she should go for it and let the chips fall where they may.

It really bugs me that people act as if a learning disability somehow disqualifies a kid from being gifted. Hell, I’m convinced that half the things we classify as “disabilities” are just gifts we don’t know how to use. We don’t know what to do with them, so we slap a negative label on them and try to train or drug them out of kids because it’s easier than trying to figure out how to harness lightning. And in the process, we end up introducing the false god of “I can’t” to a 10-year-old who spontaneously interprets modern art through the lens of ancient literature and articulates her findings to a receptive stranger.

Sometimes I really hate our educational system.

Emily

On misogyny

I participated in a Facebook conversation today about Hillary Clinton and the possibility that she might run for president in 2016.

Some people loved the idea. Some hated it.

Some of Clinton’s detractors voiced legitimate concerns; a few offered bizarre conspiracy theories; and a couple revealed themselves to be practitioners of a particularly noxious species of misogyny that seems to be all the rage in some circles.

Criticizing Clinton’s performance in Benghazi or her voting record on the Iraq War is legitimate. Criticizing her for her husband’s behavior is questionable but possibly legitimate, depending on the behavior under discussion. (“I didn’t like the administration’s position on X or Y and am afraid she would bring that back” is legitimate; “She couldn’t control her husband” is sexist nonsense.)

Criticizing Clinton because you consider her physically unattractive is — pardon my blunt language — inexcusable, misogynistic bullshit. We are not talking about whether she is qualified to be a Hooters waitress. We are talking about whether she is qualified to be the leader of the free world.

When you take cheap shots at a powerful, accomplished woman based on your opinion of her appearance, what you are really saying is that you are an immature, small-minded buffoon who views all women as sex objects, and if you do not regard a woman as a potential sex partner, she has no value to you — regardless of her talent, intelligence, education, experience or professional skills.

That doesn’t tell me anything about Clinton, but it tells me everything I could ever need or want to know about you.

Emily

Decision

Sensory Overload (Interacting with Autism Project) from Miguel Jiron on Vimeo.

I worked with several kids with Asperger syndrome or other autism spectrum disorders during the course of my four years at Webster.

I adored those kids.

They don’t know it, but just by being part of my class, they gave Riggy a better mommy. That seems fair, since Scout gave them a better teacher. “The gift goes on,” as Sandi Patty says.

This video made me cry.

I am applying to grad school this week. For reasons.

Emily

How to reduce your stress levels

The other day, I found myself entangled in yet another Facebook conversation with a low-information voter who gets all his ideas from talk radio and direct-mail propaganda and thinks that changing the subject is a valid debate strategy.

You know the type: He starts a debate over something like whether ordinary civilians should have military-style assault rifles with high-capacity clips, and as soon as you start asking questions he can’t answer, he starts citing statistics about handgun bans. Nobody was talking about banning handguns, but he thinks he’s the second coming of Stephen Douglas because he’s managed to prove a point, and never mind that the point has absolutely nothing to do with the subject actually being debated.

Talking to one of these people is like trying to have an intelligent conversation with the Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. It gets tiresome after a while, and if you unfriend him, you only reinforce his bad behavior by making him think he scared you away with his Mad Debate Skillz.™ (“Come back here, you pansy! I’ll bite your legs off!”)

I solved the problem by announcing that from here on in, every time I saw a conservative blathering about guns, gays, abortion, President Obama, or Hillary Clinton on Facebook, I was going to donate a dollar to Hillary’s presidential campaign. (If she doesn’t run, the money goes to the Democrat of my choosing.)

My Facebook acquaintances now have three options:

1. Shut up.
2. Help pour money into the enemy’s war chest.
3. Unfriend me.

I don’t particularly care which option they choose. If they choose 1 or 3, I don’t have to listen to them. If they choose 2 … well, after watching her destroy a mansplainer the other day, I’m willing to make some sacrifices for mah-girl. I put two bucks in her jar this afternoon, and I’ve never been happier to see obnoxious political spam crawling across my feed.

Emily

Folk Thursday: Odetta sings Dylan

I considered writing a post about the shootings in Connecticut, but Dylan pretty much covers everything I have to say on the subject, and he does it far more eloquently than I could. Odetta’s voice just reinforces the message.

Emily

What did you just call me?

“You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”
— Inigo Montoya, The Princess Bride

I’m not sure why, but at some point in the last 10 years or so, Madison Avenue apparently handed down a decree that all marketing directed toward women should henceforth include the word diva.

Sporting-goods stores pitch athletic bras with “diva night” specials. Main Street programs host “diva” shopping events. Hardware stores sell “diva”-themed tools with pastel handles. Minor-league ballclubs offer “diva” packages involving pink T-shirts and pregame wine-tasting events. Christian bookstores sell “diva” Bible covers. (I swear I am not making this up.) And premenopausal female environmentalists are encouraged to swap their biodegradable organic cotton tampons for reusable “Diva Cups.”

To see all that, you’d never guess that “diva” is a derogatory term.

Originally, the word diva — Italian for “goddess” — simply referred to an exceptionally talented female opera singer. Over time, the term picked up a negative connotation, as divas developed a (probably undeserved) reputation for being unreasonably demanding and difficult to please.

While “diva” can still refer to an unusually gifted performer, it has crept into everyday usage as a pejorative term for women who are talented but so spoiled, rude and unpleasant that they are generally considered more trouble than they are worth. This fact ought to make the term “diva” absolutely verboten in marketing circles — but for some reason, it hasn’t.

Try this: Look back at that list of items above, insert the phrase “high-maintenance bitch” everywhere you see the word “diva,” and tell me how likely you would be to purchase a product with such a name.

Unless I have just blown you off the stage with a two-and-a-half-octave cadenza, I’m going to assume that when you say “diva,” you are saying that I am a pain in the arse, not complimenting my awesome coloratura.

If you’re going to call me a difficult bitch, why would I want to do business with you? Why would I want a derogatory, arguably misogynistic term emblazoned across my chest or printed on my purse, screwdriver, or Bible cover? What do I gain by reinforcing a stereotype that says female prodigies are more trouble than they’re worth?

Enough.

Ownership of a functional uterus does not make me a diva. It merely makes me female — and if you want my business, you’ll acknowledge that and stop treating me like a 5-year-old who hasn’t yet outgrown her “princess” phase.

Emily

A plea for help

OK, so here’s the deal: The Oklahoma Route 66 Association is pretty much flat broke, so I need y’all to do me a favor, if you can afford it:

Send us money.

We do a lot of good work for the road — promoting businesses, helping tourists find their way down 66, publishing our free annual Trip Guide, doing hands-on historic preservation projects, etc., etc., etc. — but we can’t do it without private donations. We don’t get state money. We don’t get funding from bigger organizations. We don’t get much of anything. We operate on a shoestring, but that shoestring has gotten increasingly frayed, and I’m afraid it’s going to snap one of these days.

Every little bit helps. Clean out your couch cushions. Look under the floormats in your car. Dump out the nickels that have been breeding in the bottom of your purse. Swap your $5 venti mocha Frappuccino for a cup of coffee from the break room at the office and send us the difference. Whatever. We’re not picky. We run on a very tight budget, so any amount you can send will make an impact.

Please send your donations to:

Oklahoma Route 66 Association
P.O. Box 446
Chandler, OK 74834

To learn more about the Oklahoma Route 66 Association, visit www.oklahomaroute66.com or call (405) 258-0008.

Oh, and please pass the word to anybody you know who might be interested in helping. Post this link on your Facebook, Tweet it, Pin it, e-mail it, whatever — just get the word out. We need all the help we can get.

Thanks in advance for your support.

Emily

Labor of love

Ron and I spent our Labor Day weekend working on a preservation project at the beautiful and historic Boots Motel on Route 66 in Carthage, Mo.

Here are some before, during and after photos from our project:

A storm and some equipment issues kept us from getting anything done Saturday.

We got the equipment issues sorted out and began stripping the neon off the sign by mid-morning Sunday. Ron Hart, who manages the motel, also removed a large metal panel from one side. He didn’t find the wiring access he wanted, but we got an idea of how the sign looked when it said “BOOTS COURT.”

Removing the panel made that side of the sign much faster and easier to paint.

Prep work took most of yesterday. I started today by hitting the channel letters on the south side of the sign with a coat of white paint.

Fresh paint really made the letters pop.

Next came a coat of black on the background.

The two Rons (Hart, pictured, and Warnick, helping from the ground) raised the “MOTEL” panel into place. I was pretty excited to see how it looked.

Next came the north side of the sign. Here it is with the black background filled in. Ron Hart did all the parts I was either too short or too scared to reach.

With the background all filled in, I painted the letters on the north side of the sign.

Love the contrast between the old paint (“BOOTS”) and the new (“MOTEL”).

Just a little more….

Finished! Ron Hart is going to take care of touchups and paint the green bars later, as it was getting late and we were all too hot and tired to continue.

Here’s the south side of the sign.

Hope your weekend was as satisfying as mine.

Emily