A woman. An American Woman. In combat. It's called 'feminism.'

Ingredients for this My Time: equality, at least one functional vagina and womb, a bottle of champs, DIET gummy bears, and the world at large and your little lonely apartment.

Oh Honey, did you read THE NEWS? That's right, American ladies, we get to go to combat now along with our penisy counterparts! Oh, and did you hear?

"The move could open hundreds of thousands of front-line positions and elite commando jobs to women."

elite commando

FINALLY. A new stripper name I can get behind. And really, Honey, I get so sick of being rich and spending all my money on things other than preserving my virginity with knife skills, attendance to a despot who is the only leader in the middle east who doesn't disparage sub-Saharan Africans, and equal involvement in the politics of my country. Well, that despot is dead (the world sings in praise!) even though his death was a pretty hue distraction to real problems, and his despot level (don't worry, Honey, I'm making a chart) wasn't anywhere near despoto superior. I mean, he's as good as the USA is, right? He had an army full of WOMEN. See? EQUALITY.

Just look at that dude. He slept on roofs when he traveled to other countries. A roof in Paris. Because that was his tribe's tradition. Well, unless he's in the USA, because we have better ways of dealing with despots. Channels!


I mean, Honey, to be an American woman is to be polarizing. And to live in Missouri and be in the charity board business, looking for a tenured position in charity, is to experience this intensely and have less conversation about it. How do you know that?

A My Time Fun Game:

If you are a curvy, downright fat, sharp-faced, somehow not ideally attractive according to porn and/or MTV standards, repeat the two sentences above about polarization to your colleagues or the cool guys at the bars you hang out with who, you know, would never call you to hang out with them and the other cool guys, but are nice nonetheless and you all consider each other friends. Blink. Blink. Do it. Really. Or if you do fit into an ideal idea of beauty and piety for women, have a busty, chatty gal-pal do it instead. Here's you or that woman:

Now, if you're lucky, here's the best response you can get:

then he backs away into a corner with a Slim Jim

 But chances are you'll get some polite incomprehensible response that is akin to telling you to fuck off, if you were from the planet that could recognize that.

And ask a very petite, slender, quiet (and/or COY DEPENDING ON THE AMOUNT OF ALCOHOL) light-haired lady whose face looks smiley and voice is quiet to say the same sentences, but in the form of a question.  She wonders what they think! That might be you, so you can take this position. Here's this other lady, and the presumption is that you aren't one or the other type, but that if women are polarizing, society NEEDS SAFETY and types you for such occasions:

 Here's what she gets:

"I just like looking at you. You're nice. This other bitch told me her sure opinion on the matter and it was really offensive and unfair. I'm glad you're not like her. Look at my man brain-light head gear."

Girlfriends, compare notes over a bottle of Tattinger. If you're both straight, question what it will be like to have sex with a man again after your little experiment.

Or, maybe your vagina provides such polarizing pheromones into the air that you literally can't remember the last time a straight man tried to have straight sex with you.

That's ok, girl, that doesn't mean your opinion doesn't count. It might mean that you are highly unattractive to your polarizing community, EVEN IF you got laid a lot before. I mean, Honey, that was probably a different time and a different place, i.e. you were younger, hotter, less willing to speak your needs, and there were a lot more men in the cities you lived in. Don't worry, Babe, it'll happen. A lady has ways. Maybe you can enlist a girlfriend for help with this, too?

OH BUT WAIT. I forgot after getting all caught up in my story, Honey. YOU ARE EQUAL. YOU CAN FIGHT IN COMBAT WITH THE MEN. Let's forget that gay folks were allowed to do this before you even though they can't even get married in most US states, because that might remind us that the "right to combat" is actually a rhetorical gesture designed to put undesirables at risk while making them feel they are integrally a part of the physical, spiritual, and cultural essence of our nation. Drink that one away--another bottle of Tattinger, Doll! And let's forget that female people as well as those not in the one or other sex denomination our culture allows for do not en mass engage in war, rape, genocide, profit from them, or encourage them. BECAUSE THAT WOULD BE SEXIST YOU SEXIST LADY, YOU! Remember, sexism is simply stating the facts about the differences in the sexes. Blink. Blink. It's not actually instilling defamatory and destructive reactions to a biological sex or chosen gender. That's just fun!

Oh, am I a Bitter Betty? Er, a Downer Daggy? I'm sorry, Honey. Back to the topic at hand. You now have the right to combat. Women fought hard for this for you. Because female officers fought for that right, that means it is an award for women across this country. That's what feminism is. And you're welcome.

Before we all head off to combat, can we have one last drink? And honey, because it isn't said enough intelligently, the males we know have to deal with the exact same problems about presumptions that we do. But it is also worth saying that males are the ones that destroy the planet and humanity at large and yes, that's a polarizing opinion. But you know what, Honey? It's worth discussing, with men, women, and those whose chromosomes read across a spectrum of in-betweens and others. As you know, I love men. Too much.

THE THINGS I've done when they've asked.

THE THINGS they've done when I've asked!

So, for me, combat as equality makes sense. I fight with them. I die with them. I don't have to love them. I am one of them now. We have a common enemy. It's simple, easy, and I want to kill myself less when I think this way. I've finally found the answer to my suicide prevention: die at war. It is a good day indeed, Honey.

It's a win-win for the USA and women everywhere today!

champers on me,
Dagmar

I'm Back! And Thinner than Ever (You're Welcome)

Hello Honey! It has been so long and we have SO MUCH to talk about that I fear this will be quite rambling. Please forgive my lack of tact, brevity, and concern for your time.

It has been so long, I know. If I knew you were going to be so interested in me affirming that I'm still alive through things like "communication," "keeping up with communication," and "responding to requests for communication," I wouldn't have started becoming "friends" with you in the first place. As if I trust that such interest in me as a human being could sustain! As if I actually believe that you care. As if I'd trust that you'd come if I called you before I ended up on the floor in the corner AGAIN. As if I'd tell you what I THOUGHT about THAT and DID with an ABALONE KNIFE. Honey, that's what Xanax and cable is for. And yet, you ask me, "where are how are you?" Congratulations on being a human being you goddamn bleeding heart.

                                            Oh, you got me. I kid. Really. Just joking.

 

Now, let's move away from your fickle interest in our friendship and get back to MY interest in not our friendship and substance friends. Today is Sunday, Honey. You know that is hard for me. Let's look at what my elegant home looks like on a late Sunday morning.

Elegant? Yes. Innocuous? No. My camera seems to be an optimist, as the amount of light it's showing you does not accurately reflect the amount of darkness my house is in. The $10,000 Roberto Cavalli curtains are closed. And that's the thing about being so rich, Honey: sometimes if you want to show off what you have, you have to highlight what you never will, i.e., the sun. But my, those curtains do look elegant as they close me into my safety.

And that's real gift of wealth, Honey. It hides the parts of you that are the poorest. I can't remember the last time I didn't have a conversation with myself on a Sunday that went like, well, you could hang yourself from the beams on your front porch so as to feel the sun on your face, and suddenly the forced survival lessons in the woods with timed rope-tying sessions your father implemented makes sense!

...but wait, you'd have to go outside to do that. Out of the question. Well, you could run the bed knife along your arms and lean backward...but of course you'd never be found because you go days without anyone checking in and the cat would eat you.

DO NOT DEPRESS YOUR DOG, TOO,

...but a lady learns to never inflict trauma on another creature that is rightfully her own. The trauma, not the animal. And then I'm like, well, this damn cat is still alive and clearly needs your help. Who else would change her diapers? Conversely, who else would she let change her diapers? Why do I have an animal with diapers?

Oh wait. I'm still asleep in my nightly dream, Honey. Sorry. Let me wake up from it and move on.

Ok, I'm awake from my nightmare because CLEARLY I think I'm too important to die anyway. I mean, I'M RICH AND FAMOUS! I've slept with men WHO OWN BOATS! I HAVE A SPECIAL SPECIES OF CAT FOR CHRIST'S SAKE! And then you forget that you were having a conversation about your suicide idealization because you're like, goddamn Manx cat what are you doing now? Where did you get that pedestal?

I mean, really, what love one can be reminded of, and that is the sublime element of the earth that makes me shake. Seriously, if you move an animal inch by inch to stay in a sun spot, you are truly taken. And Honey, now that the morning Vicodin and Grey Goose Bailey's Silk Nog VITAMIN MIX shake is kicking in, I can tell you that this is what I try to do for you, my friends. I would drag your tired body through the sun until the freaky space star took off for the day. And then, again.

this bitch.

 The conclusion, Honey, is that, like that personality-less Carrie that every rich man in Manhattan wants to bed (AHEM WHITE MANHATTAN), "I wondered, did suicide require a level of sobriety that I was unable to meet?"

"It was then that I realized, did my blue eyeshadow make me blue, or is it my own blueness blah blah pun"

I mean, I've just started my semi-precious stone furniture collection! Who else, alone in the dark, will sit upon my mother of pearl stool, the coolness and hardness of which I covet? To be luminescent and full, all angles and reflection. To sit upon this is as if to be stable because the suchness of you is made through your primordial history. The stability of the rock does not decline.

And lo, Honey, if you don't mind me saying so, who would put their head inside of my abalone square? To feel that surrounding one's head, the same head that has had its share of injury and should probably be checked out for aenurisms, etc but as decided not to until one learns how to spell aenurism, etc the luminescent coolness of the sea, a family history made of ashtrays and forced dives off of cliffs, a way to not see beyond the glare. What then becomes of this?

Let's move on from this melodramatic stuff and get to ALL THE OTHER THINGS I have to talk to you about. I mean, it has been a long time, and FINALLY that Vicodin has set in so I can consider our friendship again. I'll move through the list, and hope that this list reminds me that I really need to get back to updating this internet exchange more often.

I had my vagina removed! You might think, oh that sounds dreadful, the vagina is such a great thing yatta yatta feminism embodiment empowerment rediscovery after rape intelligence calm spectrum of yatta yatta good life blah. But really, after the fucking classy man, I just can't with it. And she couldn't with me. So, she's moved on down the road.

every vagina has the prerogative to be a hobo

And I, Honey, AM THINNER THAN EVER! Aren't you so happy? You really would not know how much weight that little lady brings into the equation. She really has a no joke history that adds the pounds.

 

so judgmental about the history!

So here I am, thinner than ever, i.e. HAPPIER THAN I COULD POSSIBLY BE EVER AGAIN UNLESS I GREW ANOTHER VAGINA AND REMOVED IT AGAIN AND SENT THAT HOBO DOWN THE ROAD. So, that means, triumphantly, I can consume and become a state of safety and calm.

Oh, it was so lovely to not have her around for the holidays. I mean, at a lovely charity ball where one sees the old lovers around the champagne fountain, and one GETS A TEXT FROM AN EX WHO IS STANDING ACROSS THE ROOM that says "I wish this were different," what does a lady do? Shrug.  Without a vagina around reality becomes so clear: I mean OBVIOUSLY a man could not have acted differently in the past, nor could he change the present, and is only empowered enough to WISH that "this"--and not a particular person's behavior--might be, well, "different." I mean, the ol' vagina might say, how about apologizing, dude? How about recognizing that you aren't powerless in the history of personal exchanges? How about just being a human being? But now that I don't have a vagina, I see the truth: how could a mere white man who has had a good life ever assert power in the first place? Clearly it's the vagina's fault.

how else would this dude happen?

 

 Oh, and what about THE OTHER ONE? Of course when I STILL HAD MY VAGINA I drove 4 hours to a dinner with an ex and his new girlfriend and sister. And he was an hour late, and OF COURSE we sat and drank in the same restaurant--same table--that 8 years before he had yelled at me at. Which he did not remember, and I did, as I was so in love with him and willing to go anywhere for him. As his new girlfriend sweetly tried to explain to me the intellectual pursuits I had dedicated my life to by explaining jouissance, I believe IT WAS MY VAGINA that suggested we explore what that actually means as I guided us into my car to listen to Elvis's "Only The Strong Survive" while he and his lady held a 19th century poster of verbs in a river that I placed on them and I passed around a bottle of the perfume I was wearing for us each to smell. I believe it was my vagina who said, SEE THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE SUBLIME AND JOUISSANCE? 

And it was my vagina who steered the wheel all those hours home in the dark while I cried and listened to Elvis. Clearly only a vagina allows for such female problems. And clearly it is only because of my vagina that I will probably be known as the crazy ex-girlfriend. For I have nothing to do with it.

at a local Costco, obviously

I guess now is the time where I have to admit that I still have la vhagzine. And I, consumed with jealousy, can't believe that women pop up out of the ground like out of some cute girl hole and get with all the men I know whenever they want. I am jealous that I have never found some hole in this town that I live in. Before I got here I was vibrant, humorous, and actually had admirers. And now, now? I think my body has gone dormant. It does not suggest nor detect any desire connected to it. Well, I guess I'm lucky that I all I think about when I think about love, sex, and human connection is:  NEVER AGAIN. It's a gift, really. For the first time in my life a desire to connect physically and emotionally comes in second to a desire to never do that ever again.

welcome to the jungle: never again

So what instead remains? Well, Honey, I am now the proud attender of prisoner parole hearings. The strangest thing happened. I was writing in my memoir and it occurred to me that as a child raised by a very rich and prestigious man who died in a hail of golden coins, my father's bad investments corresponded to his brother's murder. His brother, a famous and rich spy working with the Soviet Union, had died in a battle to the death. The men who murdered him are now in prison, and since my father has now died and gone to rich man heaven, I realized that it is me who can attend these men's parole hearings and speak for my father. What this means is something I will have a separate post about, but needless to say, my lofty and wishwashy thoughts of suicide have to take a back seat to speaking for, dare I say AS, a rich man who has lost a rich brother. I have a voice of authority to speak, and I will. My new hobby at the California Department of Correction awaits. And the new wardrobe I must purchase as the widow of justice is undeniable.

hats!

It is good to be so wealthy, Darling. It is so good. It keeps you busy, doesn't it? It keeps you here for the moment. It keeps you hidden from the world in HATS.

Well, the morning pills and booze combo has produced a headache that requires my attention, aka my passing out into hopefully a dreamless sleep. I will write more in the next few days, and as I slide back into this internet world, the posts will become better at being poignant and interesting. This one was obviously boring except for the SEMI-PRECIOUS STONE FURNITURE. Oh, so much more interesting stuff to share. But alas, I must depart for the moment into the world of Roberto Cavalli dreams and Alexander McQueen nightmares. As only a rich woman can. Ta ta, Love.

Champers on me!
Daggy

I know, I know

Honey, it has been forever. But you know, it's fall, aka the holidays, aka, Charity Ball Season, aka, my TIME TO SHINE. So, give me a week, and I will write with all the sordid details. And will continue such writing until my own end. Champers on me then! Dagmar.

Body Vs Disk

Ingredients for this My Time: THINKING with DRINKING

Sometimes I like to think. And sometimes, thinking likes to devour me.

 When that time comes, I like to drink.

ETHEREAL. PENSIVE. GUSHING.

It is as if because I am a woman, Think can consume my body as if it were an object on the economic market to purchase, own, and discard when no longer viable or another upgrade comes along. I mean, whoever heard of a woman's body being a good on the market, a commodity one can evaluate for worth?

Oh. Wait.

This Mr Think often comes to say hello to me, and even after introducing him to Mr Drink, he refuses to leave. Mr Think has some problems with MANNERS. So what can I do to get him out of mi vida loca? I've decided a natural, holistic approach called DIET is the way.

Honey, I'm going on a disk diet. My thinking is that if I eat only while thinking about math, I'll lose this 25 lbs of bullshit I've gained since moving to my mini-mansh in the Midwestern country, and gain that much back in self-esteem. (Insert comment here about how women's bodies are not commodities to be evaluated and consumed). But really, Darling, disks.

"plus one 'Skinny Girl MargaritaTM,' please!"

They're safe. They've got everything they need on the INSIDE while maintaining a demure, white, symmetrical OUTSIDE. They're not hurting anyone, they don't make mistakes, and they feel absolutely nothing. I've been fortunate enough to have my training in being a woman starting early on, with my attentive mother putting me on diets, telling me no one will like me if I don't lose weight, and occasionally instigating a nice cardio session with her fists on my body or a bar of soap to the mouth (one can never be too clean! Lesson number one!). But some women can still learn that "you are what you eat!" And Honey, I've decided that I really don't need another pre-divorce ceremony (wedding) or another alimony struggle if I can simply and finally be: a disk.

What's that you say, Honey? I can't turn into a delicious disk with a slightly toasty BUT STILL WHITE exterior and a sassy, hidden inside that will only be revealed once I'm consumed by someone who has chosen and paid for me? Well, Honey, if my body is a commodity, then I'm a good on the market, and I should be able to upgrade like every other Apple product. I choo-choo-choose upgrading to a disk!

Ah, Honey, only a short time left for me in the Midwestern Country. Where will I go? How will I get there? I don't know. But I do know that my legacy will be the first woman who has finally understood that her body is a commodity. Sure, the feminists might tell you, "boo! Women's bodies are not commodities! We are ourselves! We are not owned by a male-dominant media and world governments nor are we going to compare ourselves to celebrities' bodies or magazine covers that are not real representations of women! We age and we have cellulite!" But here's the thing: our bodies are commodities. BUT GOD THAT'S SO FREEING! You know why? WE CAN UPGRADE! And since I've gained 25 lbs since moving to the Midwestern Country, I'm choo-choo-choosing to upgrade to a disk. A beautiful, thoughtless, changeless-until-consumed- disk. And the best thing about being a commodity is that once we are consumed, we are nothing. Lo, to be Not-Are...the next place I move will have heroin, again, at least. A lady likes to keep her options open!

"i can't stand you too much longer                                               _
can't you see                                                                              _     _
you can use me for some time                                                _           _
then i'm history                                                                     _                _
one more kiss then i'm history                                           _                     _
                                                                                        _                           _
well the sad martyr come                                             _                _               _
i scratch your arms and you won't come                                        _
scratch your eyes so you can't see                                                 _
what it means to feel so dumb                                                        _
one more kiss then we're history                                                    _
                                                                                                        _
what's the point of getting angry                                                     _
over me?                                                                                         _
you can use me for some time                                                        _
it's a game to me                                                                             _
i don't know you where you are                                                      _
like you used to be                                                                          _
one more leap then we're history"                                                  _


Of course when I'm not thinking too much, I'm blissed out. Instead of eradicating myself from history, I make a place for myself in it. While that feeling hasn't been around for awhile, it comes at times. Like exactly RIGHT NOW. The truth is that I've chosen to be in a non-affirming situation right now to strengthen other things and get a degree. What this degree means to me the closer I am to it is less and less. In order for me to find a balance between oblivion and bliss (and I do enjoy the pendulum of both at times, while with intimacy, music, travel, and vice) affirmation is something that I would like. It helps. Being told one is beautiful (something that hasn't happened to me in the last year or so but was a part of my life for so long that I guess I presumed it would persist) and knowing that the person saying that is sleighed solely by one's body is really lovely. Yet, this feeds into the commodity game that make women suffer so, as well as men who buy into a standard account of the woman's body that can be equated with lust, love, and happiness. And yet, it is helpful to wade in superficials sometimes. The problem, I suppose, is when we lose the difference between superficial and important in our own self-worth, or that we buy into the concept of self in the first place. Me, I feel like the energy I am is more like an avalanche or some forward motion that, because of its motion, chances from one thing to the next via action.

Honey, it's true.I feel forward movement yet without a hill in this Midwestern Country to fall down. It's embarrassing for us all. So I make my hills, hence :

Recurring My Time

"reflection"

Miami > Email

Ingredients for this My Time: Miami is love, being told you're not enough is hard, and they both still let you drink champagne! Basically the ingredients are widespread frustration and champs. Duh.

Oh Honey, I can't remember the last time I felt so "okay" with myself. I'm in MIAMI! I mean, sure, there's still the debilitating lack of self-esteem yatta yatta from getting emails THAT PEOPLE CC OTHER OFFICIALS ON TO PREVENT YOU FROM...WHAT? when you're trying to be "okay" in Miami, like these:


The first email I got explained why I was not right for a position I was in the best position to get--not because of my incredible excellence, mind you, but because of my seniority and work accomplished--that I did not. This email explained to me that I did not get said position because the other person had a strong background in things that had nothing to do with the position as well as understood a group dynamic and was aware of the needs of others. Turn that sentence into one about me and not the other, and you will see where my head went. It was one of the most confusing emails I've ever gotten because it said, "you didn't get this because another person has _______," and basically neglected saying that the decider just felt uncomfortable around me, but wanted me to know how hard it was for them to decide and transparency is what was trying to be achieved in writing this email and CCing other authority members and they so looked forward to continuing a conversation with me about all the things I'm doing that make me a viable candidate for said position.

(was my reaction)

AND:

The next email asks if I am indeed ready to proceed after I sent an email saying I was indeed ready to proceed. Of course I suddenly realized that I was not ready nor would I be if I were asked such questions. I have no self-esteem, Honey, and questions that don't start "would you like as your side ____" are too much for me at this point.

(my before/after reaction)

AND:

another email spent articulate, paragraph-form time explaining the most basic mistakes I make that prevented me from success. I don't disagree, Honey, but it does make paranoia about a specific thing match up nicely with someone else coincidentally pointing out said thing as a flaw, and then, voila: YOUR ARE PSYCHIC, BUT NO GOOD.

(was my cliche yet actual reaction)

AND then you are reminded of all the past actually crazy emails you had to save to "protect yourself" and not just the ones where someone points out your inadequacies. Those emails had to be saved because when one is in a system, people would rather not step in and help a problem but keep silent long enough until it goes away. I think the logic is polite silence > lawsuits. These emails, Honey, simply let you know what you've always suspected about yourself--that you're basically a fraud who has made it "this" "far" due to others' bumbling way through submission and acceptance procedures because they don't have a rigorous standard. Well, Honey, the thing is...MON$Y. WHICH I HAVE. WHICH MEANS:

If you don't have a bunch of money, you have to listen to these emails, especially the first one, and think about how you are perceived by brilliant, stable, professional Authority Figures who do terrible things but have learned that true professionalism--true engagement with the world and pushing organizations forward into the next century--is to not talk about IT, whatever the IT happens to be that day. But the second you become w$althy you realize that the emotional and mental stakes are so high for a dedication to this kind of criticism--a kind that presumes you have no awareness about "the needs of others" or an "understanding of a group dynamic" that you realize your world can be completely other. I mean, if you have mon$y you do not need these folks to evaluate you for an excellence achieved at a certain level that they have deemed not uncomfortable for them, and demonstrative of your ability to not make others uncomfortable. Ta-da! Degrees! 

You can choose other things for success--I don't mean emotional, mental success--obviously you have to seek that out at any cost (haha I kid! That's what alcohol's for!)--I mean that your day-to-day life takes on an affirming stability that makes it possible for you to reject seeking out such stability in a field that really, I mean come on Honey, does not think you should be in. It thinks its ideas are better than yours, its discourse is more potent with information and civilization, its globalness promotes a diversity yet a specialization that you do not possess, and its success comes from a standard that you will not elevate to. I mean, I'M NOT SAYING THEY'RE WRONG, as the poor woman inside always acknowledges, 

but let's get real: I got al$mony, Honey. With an amount of money that provides stability and comfort, you wouldn't give a goddamn fuck what people you're striving to demonstrate your specialization in front of think, nor would you think your failings are signs of an overall failure in life. You would spend time getting better at what you want by hiring experts, or moving on to other desires that you've always wanted to pursue but had no means with which to do so. Because with the appropriate amount of stability, one is less anxious, one has the space and time to think about what is happening, one can be bitter sad or whatever before moving on, and one doesn't have to strive to specialize in the art of charity boards, a field more rampant with sexism than the sciences, surprisingly, and really dumb articles saying nothing important about it and personal testimonials encouraging women to deal with it instead of the charity board. You can think it all over with an eccentric activity that helps you get calm.

So, lucky me, I have all this money, thus I don't need to worry about seeking affirmation or maligning myself a failure in the world I've chosen to pretend to be a part of for some-odd years. 

Blink. 

Blink. 

Blink.

But wait--YOU ARE IN MIAMI! YOU ARE NOT IN AN EMAIL! Oh, I forgot! I was INVITED to a very special hotel in South Beach to give a very well-received talk about "things"  to do with all the m$ney I have! It was fantastic, and I got so much work done of my own choosing.

I worked out/thought about killing myself

I made new friends who taught me some valuable lessons

"One must uphold the spandex quota for Miami, Dagmar!"

I got SO MUCH work done

And I managed to feel a beautiful kind of hazy while allowing myself to gain a sense of humor about getting emails that help me/remind my of my inability to achieve

There's always the fear. Will they think I'm bitter? Mentally unstable? Unprofessional in a "professional" cultural climate? Unintelligent? Incapable of grace? Fill in the blank? Well, Honey, the thing is, women are those things. So are men. I am right now. But I never was before moving to my Midwestern charity board. What is it about the systems we have in place that make women cause more discomfort to others in the system when they are these things? The women who achieve in the system and positions I am in are silent, private, phobic of conflict or engagement until they feel safe to speak. Then they speak about their past experiences with sexism in the charity board. More women charity interns are in the Humanities, but the boards are run more by men. Once that famous male board member stops touching slender women on the smalls of their backs and telling them how good they look, once famous board dude gets to stop hiring mini versions of himself in a well-known charity publication who hires female interns to fuck them (rejecting better qualified but less desirable women on his part), once I'm not told my voice has become "a problem" in me securing a position I'm right for, when a candidate who gets it only does because she is calmer, because I speak to injustice in the system to officials, then, Honey, I'll shut the fuck up. Really, and remember, I'm TALKING ABOUT A CHARITY BOARD OBVS, if one official admitted the sexism inherent in our "charity board," I would finally forever be silent.

"but I do expect that lady interns teach us about men in the charity board canon to get their degrees :)"

Before I came to this charity board I never once spoke up, or "complained," about the departments (of charity functions!) I was in. Not once. Hard to believe? Well I also used to be too scared of losing control to consume alcohol. We all grow the fuck up. So why shouldn't the charity board system?

Ah, that felt good. Back to being an insecure mess who thinks her only problem is herself. But that's what marriage and charity boards are for, Honey. Avoiding the problem of oneself.

(champagne, EXTRA LETTUCE taco bell, a hard line on oneself and the board in a blog, and letting it all go)

When this EMAIL JOURNEY is all over in May, that is, if I secure the charity board title I've been vying for for so long and doing twice the work to try and learn from, it will all even out. Because remember, I have so much money, which means, that only the poor have to be in positions to consider how others are evaluating them for success. Blink. Blink. Blink. In the end, it's important for all of us to be able to consider how being given opportunities that come with financial accolades make being alive, accomplishing work, specializing or not, easier. Miami gave me champs, filet, and the ability to share my work while completing it, all on its dime. Whatta town.

my self-esteem was dependent on this pool. alas! it is gone from me

And when I'm feeling my own kind of safe (read: xanax floater in my champs) I love my Midwestern charity board. I learn a lot from it, and I believe in everyone a part of it. They are my community--I chose them even if it feels like no one chose me. I am here, I will get my charity board certification, and I will make my life happy with or without a position that my certification presumes I will try to get. We all try to make ourselves happy in our own ways. I vent the worst parts of myself

to maybe someday find the best.

champers and self-loathing on me! I always have a credit card to get you drunk, Honey.
Daggy