To say it aloud

Trigger warning: this post discusses non-consensual sex, specifically rape.

I was reading about the Clothesline project over on Scheherazade in Blue Jeans, and remembering when I lived in the college dorms and walked past the line every day.

I didn't want to acknowledge it. To look at the installation would be to admit that I had been raped. But this is not about that. This is about the boy I knew in high school who was raped.

He told me one day, about how he was at a party, and drunk. And when he woke up, he was tied to a bed, where two girls refused to let him go, and had sex with him. I wonder, sometimes, if that was why he cultivated the persona of a "player", used drugs, had trust issues... maybe.

But what I was thinking about today was how his story was the mirror image of the one I knew, and how I have never heard another case of a man being raped by a woman. I'm sure it happens... but do they tell anyone?

Who could they tell? How would that fit with the ideas of masculinity as strength, as sexually adventurous, as sexually indiscriminate? Who would they tell?

It's not really my story, but I felt the need to say something about his story, which he may, or may not have ever told again.

Show and Tell Time

The lovely blog Stirrup Queens decided (apparently some time ago) that show and tell is wasted on the young, and decided to kick it web 2.0 style, by having a weekly post where people can post a show and tell on their own blog, and then get rounded up at the weekly thread. So without further ado:

Shadowedge's Show and Tell:

This is a cake (yes, posting about a cake was totally a nod to Stirrup Queen's post about making a sukkah cake) that I made for my very dear friend, Moonkai for her fairy themed birthday party. Now, Moonkai's favorite cake is angel food cake with whipped cream frosting, which is pretty easy to bake. However, it is much harder to decorate. So, I plotted very carefully. I would buy nasturtium flowers at the farmer's market, since they are edible, festive, and would go with the theme. Then, I decided that the cake needed a topper. I went to every party store, scoured the inter net, and could not find a fairy topper that was not a) so far out of my budget as to be laughable (50$ for a cake topper?) or b) Tinker Bell, which was simply not the theme.

I finally saw some pictures of the Schelich fairies, and then had to track them down. I finally found one at a local Target. I was almost done. But the figurine was heavy enough that I was worried it would either squish, or fall off, the cake. So I grabbed a fancy vase, and turned it upside-down in the middle of the angel food cake after I frosted it with the whipped cream. that supported the figurine quite nicely, and the nasturtiums hid the edges nicely. I also, (as you can kind of see) sliced strawbeeries to decort the bottom edge.

Needless to say, Moonkai was appropriately impressed.

Go see the rest of Show and Tell here.

Books I've been obessed with...

So, my grandfather died, and my car was hit by a truck, and the insurance companies are still giving me the run around, and I'm taking three classes, and working, and my comprehensive examinations are THIS WEEK, and what have I been doing?

I've been reading: non-academic pleasure reading. (Also, I cleaned the bedroom, which is way more impressive than it sounds).

So, what have I been reading?

David Weber's Honor Harrington series:

This is some seriously good hard science fiction with a distinctly militaristic bent. And awesome. Honor is a (female!) strong, capable warrior, who kicks ass, takes names, and has a treecat. Yep. The first novel On Basilisk Station is available free from the Baen Free Library, which I love more than bagels. And I really like bagels.

J.R. Ward's The Black Dagger Brotherhood series:

I lovingly refer to this as my vampire porn crack. Exceeding well written, this series could boil a river in midwinter. Yes, it is that hot. The female characters have minds of their own, and the new take on vampires (they are actually a separate species, and can only be sustained on the blood of the opposite sex of vampires) gives this paranormal romance an interesting twist. The series is not perfect (same sex attraction is not addressed until the most recent book, there is some gender role stereotyping, especially in the behavior of the male characters) but it is well worth the read. Start with the first book, Dark Lover.

Re-reading:
Tamora Pierce's Alanna the Lioness series:

Man, I love these books. They are young adult books that I encountered in high school, and are excellently written, with one of my favorite female knights ever. Alanna doesn't want to go to a convent, and her twin brother, Thom doesn't want to become a knight. Instead they switch places, and Alanna becomes Alan, a page in training. Alanna has to work for her shield, both against her size, and against the Duke of Comte, who she distrusts with good reason. Plus, there is always the chance she could be discovered before she earns her shield, and be sent home in disgrace... Alanna's coming of age is documented with grace and bluntness, and watching her struggle with love is moving. I still want to be like Alanna when I grow up.

So, that's some of what I've been reading, for the past few weeks.

Prejudice and other unpleasant surprises

I was not expecting to be hit by a car. I was not expecting anything at the moment, I suppose. I was driving home, just making my way through one of those immense parking lots that sprawl in all directions, and are always mostly empty.

There was a line of cars parked in the fire lane, and I drove around them. As I did so, the truck pulled out, into the passenger side of the car. My neck was whipped around, and all I could do was utter the words " Oh no, not again." This was not the first car accident for me, and the specter of months in rehab for my already injured back and neck flashed through my head.

I pulled into a parking spot, afraid the truck that had hit me would just drive away. But no, the vehicle pulled up just a few spaces down from me. And that was when I noticed that the driver was Hispanic. It was only much later that I had a chance to think about the upwelling of anger and blame that came into my mind, visions of illegal drivers without insurance, angry men yelling at me, no one believing me. I was frightened, and shaken up, but all my fear and angry were directed at the poor man who had run into me. And, part of it was because he was Hispanic.

Typing this, I'm aware of how it sounds. It sounds awful. It doesn't sound like how I would like to think of myself. It sounds like racism.

But I, mindful of how I was treated the time I accidentally ran into a woman's car, was polite. I may have been a bit short, and insist on calling the insurance companies, as we stood there is the blazing sun, but I tried not to make what had happened worse.

I did the best I could.

The gentleman could not speak English, and my Spanish is almost nonexistent. His daughter translated for us both. There was no screaming, or recriminations. Mr. Martinez (not his real name, of course) was terribly polite, admitted it was his fault, and inquired into my health. He promised that he would pay for the damage out of pocket, if the insurance company would not cover it. We shook hands as we parted, and I continued my drive home.

As I drove, I began to think of how surprised I was at his actions and kindness to a complete stranger, who he may have sensed was upset with him. I found myself thinking that for a Hispanic - I caught myself. It was only then that I started to think about my instinctive reaction, anger, and fear. I cried, both from the events of the past hour, and from the realization that, despite a liberal background, and a host of classes on just this sort of thing in college, I was a racist.

I had made judgments about Mr. Martinez from the moment I saw him, and was amazed when they were proven wrong. I can't do much about my reaction then, but I owe Mr. Martinez an apology. And I owe it to myself to be aware of people as people, rather than react to their ethnic background.

So, now, in addition to my apology, a thank you: Thank you Mr Martinez, for being a wonderful person yesterday after you hit my car.

A memory

Setting: High School

His name was Robbie. The diminutive only made him seem casual, instead of young. He was not child-like, which (come to think of it) might have been part of the attraction. The corruption of innocents came later. He rode the bus home with me, just three stops from the last one, which was mine. I was always at the end of bus routes, it seemed.

He swaggered, and smoked, and had slightly unkempt hair he was forever pushing out of his eyes. We had nothing in common. Yet somehow, I conceived a lust for him. Perhaps is the was the classic air of the bad boy from an earlier day; a greaser, almost, with his muscle shirt, decidedly working class family, slick hair, and pounding music. He sat with his legs spread, and the outline of his cock would brush against the fabric. And I lusted after him.

I had a boyfriend, and had been having sex for almost a year. I wanted all the time, obsessively. I lusted after Robbie. I flirted with Robbie. Some days he would flirt back, and some days... nothing. Which might have been part of the fascination. I found adoration boring. But I wanted to be wanted.

I invited him over, while my mother was at work. He brought over a Metallica CD, played "no leaf clover". We kissed. He tasted of cigarettes, the cranberry juice I had offered, and sweat. Bitter. He touched me for a while, and then I sent him home. Three hours of late night phone calls later, and nothing was said about that night again.

I thought of Robbie today, a song on the radio sending me back to high school. I wonder where he is, what he is doing. But not enough to try to find out. The taste was bitter, and I didn't want more of it.

New loves, and new directions

I admit that the title of this post is, perhaps, a bit of a misnomer. After all, this is not the first time I have posted verse to this blog. Indeed, since I made my confession about the hidden nature of my poetry, I have, somewhat paradoxically, been far more willing to share it.

But, there is new love in my life! Not a new love for me, but rather, a new love for my love, Mazzikin. While I have not talked at length about polyamory, and how I do it, I have mentioned ere now that I have several people whom I love very much in my life, and am involved in relationships with to varying degrees and permutations.

Mazzikin and I are secondary (yes, we use the dreaded ranking system). For us, that means we are not only not exclusive, but do not exercise veto powers over each other's partner choices. He lives an hour away, and visits most weekends. Mazzikin is extremely respectful of the relationship between Paradox ( my primary relationship) and I, and he and Paradox have a firm friendship between them.

Recently, Mazzikin had attracted the attentions of a lovely girl, and was, in fact, quite smitten with her himself. The chemistry was undeniable, at least to those of us observing. Indeed, both Paradox and I felt compelled to remark on the sizzling nature of the attraction. And, what with one thing and another, things have fallen into a lovely poly tangle. As Paradox is fond of putting it: "My girlfriend, and her boyfriend, and his girlfriend."

Recently, Mazzikin wrote about the process of this all coming together in a private post. He remarked that it would be nice if I commented on it (I'm a truly horrible commenter. I feel that unless I have something truly brilliant to say that I should not even bother, and hence, mostly don't), as the lady might like to see an affirmation of my support for this budding romance.

I agreed that it was always nice to have a bit of affirmation, and sat down to write something out. What came out was verse.

Beloved of my love

Know that it is better
than fine,
this new thing
you are weaving,
with a man I love.

We know that love
spreads, and grows, just so:
strawberry plants
with innumerable fruits
all
on the same stalk.

When you look
at each other
you glow, twin suns in an evening sky,
each the other's light.

And I'm still here,
my own light, dancing in reflected glow
of constellations lighting up the sky.

We will be called
"The Lovers"
a cluster of tiny dots
and
intangible lines
drawn together.

An Egg in my Hand.

I hate eating breakfast when I first wake up. My mother made this a moot point: I would eat, or I would not leave the breakfast table. But after I went off to college, like a fledgling bird turning her beak up on the early worm, I slowly stopped eating breakfast.

I knew it was good to eat food in the morning, that breakfast was the most important meal of the day, and all that jazz. But I stopped.

I had tea, instead, with cream and sugar.

Then, I started again. Because I was working real jobs, and couldn't just stop when I was finally hungry and have a much belated breakfast. But it was still hard for me, to wake up that little bit much earlier to make sure I had time to make and eat something.

So I boiled a half dozen eggs, one night, and for the rest of the week I walked out the door with an egg in my hand, to be eaten at my desk when I got to work.

An egg in one's hand is a satisfying thing. It is pleasantly curved, ovoid in shape, light brown in color. It is cold, but slowly warms. An egg in my hand reminds me of being a child, living on a farm. We had chickens, and I would carry each egg like a precious thing in my hands into the kitchen. An egg in my hands reminds me of my mother, and my childhood, and being fed.

An egg in my hand is breakfast.