Hor-O-Scopes: August 2021

August. Astrology. I still haven’t decided about Hor-O-Scopes and their place in knitting, crazy cat lady stuff, whining, wine, and the general poor grammar of my personal manifesto here. But I like doing hor-o-scopes for now and I’m so damn excited about Saturn leaving on August 16 I could just pee my pants. Saturn has tried to kick my ass, along with the collective asses of Sag and Gemini and Capricorns, too, and I really think I’m going to hold a little Bon Voyage & Thanks For All The Crap! party at my house come mid-August.

Not that I have any bitterness. Damn planet of hellfire and brimstone. Mumble mumble.

And, you know, don’t let your babies grow up to be astrologers. Don’t let ’em light candles and write their own stuff, let ’em be doctors and lawyers and such.

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AQUARIUS (Jan. 20 – Feb. 18)
Imagine you’re a novel. Part romance, part mystery, part B-list horror. If you want to increase the number of steamy pages between your covers, you’ll need to start making your own plotlines and conjure up some serious dialogue this summer. Start small, by picking out a love interest. Oh, wait. You’re already one step ahead of me! June is the month to get your butt in the car for a little road trip so the novel of your life contains some travel and adventure, too.

PISCES (Feb. 19 – March 20)
Pisces esta en la casa. Yes, that’s right, Pisces is in the house this month! And in the closet, the garage, the bathroom and the kitchen. Every time you turn around you’ll see your humble abode as one big Trading Spaces Marathon. Rather than focusing on the imperfections of your home and getting bogged down in detail, show your annoying inner critic the door and change the locks while you’re at it. If you loosen up the perfectionism a bit, you will free your artistic side — or at least channel Bob Vila from time to time.

ARIES (March 21- April 19)
If you put up with anymore shit this month I’m seriously going to suggest you invest in a big pair of rubber boots and start calling yourself a pig farmer. What is it with people lately and their obsession with mud-slinging crapfests? Until your name is on the Presidential ballot, declare your life a rumor-free zone. If people want to take potshots at you, tell them to do it to your face or get a new hobby. Then take a well-deserved vacation mid-summer and to hell with ’em.

TAURUS (April 20 – May 20)
Have you ever heard of the literary term “the hole in the narrative?” It’s the description of a piece of literature that has a missing piece — the narrator or the main character or the plot itself is simply missing. And you have to fill it in. Your life for the past few months has had a hole in the narrative. Until now, you weren’t sure what thread held all the pieces together, because it was the one element totally hidden from you. The bad news is that I don’t know what’s missing either. The good news is that you’ll have no trouble finding it yourself by August 28, even though you may discover someone in your inner circle isn’t quite the person your thought they were. More good news: Money money money. Money! Neptune is in your corner and your bank account will enjoy it!

GEMINI (May 21 – June 21)
The famous and rather ill-fated Southern writer Ambrose Bierce once said that beauty is “the power by which a woman charms a lover and terrifies a husband.” Ya’ll know all mysteriously dead Southern writers are telling the truth about beauty. That is a fact. Attraction could launch a thousand ships, stop a clock and at the same time drive a person mad. This has always fascinated me. Everyone within a ten-mile reach of a Gemini this month will get a taste of attraction, since you have the charm and beauty planets aligning in your favor. You’ll also benefit from Saturn leaving my sign — Cancer — and you’ll have more opportunity for throwing money at your beauty bag by mid-August.

CANCER (June 22 – July 22)
Dear Diary, I’m about tired of this Saturn shit. Saturn has been screwing up my life for almost two years now and I have had ENOUGH. I am so ready for my new boyfriend, Mars. Mars is coming to make sweet love to my house of success starting June 11. And Saturn? Yeah he’s trying to stick around. Like the smell of old fish. But come hell or high water, Saturn will leave my house on August 16th and I am throwing a party, FAREWELL BASTARD SATURN!! As usual, us Cancers are looking forward to our birthdays, too, so we can make lists of all the things we need to be and do and have in the coming year. Diary, Birthday Resolutions are so much more powerful than New Year’s Resolutions. Don’t you agree?

LEO (July 23 – August 22)
Your forecast is actually quite simple, not only for the month of June but for the whole damn rest of the year — stop spending so much time in your own head. Sing out loud, ask questions, say “Yes” when you mean YES and “No” when you mean NO. Work will be a heavy hitter in your life this month and maybe even a little stressful, so when you need to talk … don’t wait for the phone to ring. Instead, try this really ancient Chinese secret: pick up the phone yourself and make the call. Ask for what you need. All this self-analysis and soul-searching really boils down to one thing: We can’t read your mind!! We’re just a bunch of regular zodiac joes, and you have to be patient with us. Thanks! We really do appreciate it!

VIRGO (August 23 – Sept. 22)
Some people get really fixated on little things, like dust mites. Small, not able to be seen with the naked eye, but ever present and totally annoying. Sound familiar? Your fixations and anxiety are your choice — don’t while away your time and energy this month trying to eliminate a million tiny worries. Instead try this: Pick one big worry, and choose five minutes a day to consciously worry about it. Really concentrate. When your five minutes are up, let it go. (Well, hey, it’s worth a try!) With two perfectly aligned full moons in the next six weeks, you’re going to have more exciting offers than you can shake a stick at, all career- and job-related and all pretty good. Unless you treat them like dust mites and worry worry worry them to death.

LIBRA (Sept. 23 – Oct. 23)
If I had to associate you with a summer movie right now, we’d probably be showing a cross between National Lampoon’s Vacation and Jaws 3 (in 3-D no less!) I’m not suggesting you’ll be attacked by a shark driving a station wagon, I’m just saying that you’ll have your fair share of travel and adventure before summer is out … if you don’t let your fear of mishaps and near-disasters keep you from getting out of the house. There will be some challenges to your plans that may lead to a slight June Gloom, but by mid-August you will be able to look back and laugh it all off (in 3-D, no less!)

SCORPIO (Oct. 24 – Nov. 21)
Count up your nickels and dimes, ya’ll, because the mantra this month is “money.” Or, rather, the total lack thereof. Don’t even bother looking through that catalogue — and put the mouse down right now! Bad eBay, bad! Relegate your credit cards to the underwear drawer for all of June or you’ll be crying in your generic brand Cheerios come August. Cheer up, summer is one of the few times it’s easy to be broke — the great outdoors is calling, and it requires fewer clothes. Plus, Mars is moving on in and making you feel all healthy and energetic so the money crunch won’t feel like a complete vise grip.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22 – Dec. 21)
You know that strategy you’ve developed for dealing with your life when it seems peculiarly murky and incomprehensible? The one where you lock yourself up in your room with the covers pulled up to your head and watch reruns of “Divorce Court” while groaning from time to time? I hate to be the one to tell you, but your plan won’t work this month. The reason? Saturn. Saturn is finally, finally about to leave and you need to be alive and kicking to see it go! Crawl out of hiding, grab a notebook and a pen and plant yourself somewhere outdoors this month for serious contemplate-your-navel time. Don’t miss the opportunity to soak in what you think you’re missing. Saturn is leaving! By August 16th you won’t even remember “Divorce Court.” Really!

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22 – Jan. 19)
Any little change will make you feel slightly out-of-step this month, and that’s a very, very good thing. All these little quirks that upset your daily routine will just illuminate a hidden gem of your Capricorn Personality To-Do List that you’ve either checked off or made serious strides on achieving. What I’m saying here is that you’ve changed a lot more than you give yourself credit for, and when Saturn leaves us (bye Saturn! Don’t let the door hit you on the ass on the way out!) you’ll be able to clearly take stock of where you are and where you need to go. More semi-good-news: Another full moon in Capricorn in August will finally wrap up that one nagging situation you just can’t seem to control.

Weekend Recap: A pound of fabric, a pound of flesh.

I love you, Encino California. Even though you are sometimes one hundred twenty-eleven degrees outside.

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On Saturday, Faith and Sara and I met at the Farmer’s Market for breakfast, hearty sustenance for the day ahead. Nothing makes weekends more weekend-y than eating breakfast out. Food tastes better when someone else cooks it and serves it and clears your plates, but this is somehow doubly true for bacon and eggs and toast. And coffee. Mmmmm, coffee.

First stop post-breakfast was Ellen’s yard sale. I was so excited about the vintage Tupperware and lucite that I forgot to take pictures!! That is truly a shame since Ellen’s studio is a magnificent space, with all her paintings and photos and ya’ll, she is NOT MESSING AROUND with the yarn stash. There was more yarn in her studio — color coded in plastic sealed containers — than in most yarn stores.

When it comes to stash, the bar has been set high. EIGHT FEET HIGH. It was the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.

After the yard sale, Faith and Sara and I piled in the car and drove to downtown Los Angeles for my virgin trip to Michael Levine’s Loft.

Eight city blocks in Los Angeles are known as the textile district, full of nothing but fabric stores and notions and beading and foam and feather boas and street vendors making bacon-wrapped hotdogs with fried onions. It’s a glorious place.

Michael Levine’s is a big fabric retailer and their new upstairs “loft” space is a fabric-by-the-pound gluttony of goodness. If you sew, you must come here. Let me say it again: FABRIC BY THE POUND.

Inside the insanity: textiles of all kinds, $2/pound.

Faith digs for treasure; Sara finds shiny Millennium fabric; Faith with camo pattern double-knit featuring sporadic red roses and a glitter finish. So damn Klassy.

After hours and hours of this:
“Sara! Look! It’s blue fun fur! It’s Cookie Monster!”
“Laurie, was this the stretch snakeskin you wanted?”
“Faith, did you call that the hide of the Naugha?”

… we left the Loft and drove all the way across the city to Burbank for a spontaneous Ikea fix.

Give us your tired, your poor, your hungry masses. And we will give them sofas, magazine holders, cheap meatballs and soda.

Chillin’ on the morgestkleptumblotwhatever; Sara is at home; the stranger we coerced into photographing us at Ikea. Hi! You’re on the Internets!

Faith drives us back to Los Angeles; I play tourist from the backseat of the car.

It was a perfect day. I arrived home tired and dirty and sweaty and my face hurt from laughing so much!

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On Sunday, Jennifer and I went to Unwind — my gift certificate from Shannon and Karman was burning a hole in my pocket and Jen needed more scarf yarn and bigger needles.

I don’t know what they think of me at Unwind. I’m kind of dorky, and I sniff the yarn. This can’t be fun for the staff, to see some weird girl huffing fiber. But they are so nice all the same, and ya’ll they are open on Sundays! Also, did I photograph any of this? No.

After Unwind, Jen and I drove over to Shannon & Karman’s place for a good-bye party. Our favorite Amy is moving to Idaho for the rest of the summer doing artsy-fartsy film girl stuff and we will sorely miss her. Also, we told her she is not allowed to make new friends and cheat on us.

Before the party really started, it was just me, Jen, Shannon, Karman and Amy. Sitting around talking … and somehow it got on marriage, and divorce and after breaking Birthday Resolution #17 (“Stop saying bitter stuff about marriage”), someone was talking about divorce and all the sudden I burst into tears. BECAUSE I AM CRAZY.

So I am at a party, a fun event in which people do not normally CRY, and I am in a STATE, so I get up off the couch and run away … to the balcony. Upon which I discovered we were on the second floor and there was no escape from the balcony and I would have to one day, eventually, perhaps when I was old and grey and hunched over from living on the 3′ x 8′ overhang, return to the party where I had just made an embarrassing mess of things and cried like a baby.

Yup.

So there I am, knowing I’m maybe a little BATSHIT CRAZY, and also have just moved way down on the Party Guests We Must Invite To Stuff list, and it was starting to get kind of boring out there on the balcony, and I was hungry, and the cake was indoors, and there really was no escape even though I considered hoisting myself down on the neighbor’s balcony just below all Mission Impossible style, but I had on a skirt (and I was out of the clean, normal panties and so it was thong-up-the-butt day and ya’ll know, that would not have been pretty), and finally there was nothing left to do but smoke a cigarette, and Jen came out to assure me that there was no escape and she still loved me. And also they kind of needed the balcony for making the hotdogs. So could I please come inside and stop being crazy until everyone ate?

So I came out from hiding and then we ate hot dogs and tried to pretend nothing happened.

And that was my weekend. A good running start, but flummoxed at the end by the reappearance of Mentally Incompetent McGee. That’s me in case ya’ll wondered. Someone please tell me the inappropriate blubbering stops eventually. Lie to me if you have to. Because I am about tired of this crying shit, and damn tired of myself, and I am ready for a return to the fabled and magic land of mascara and eye shadow. Ya’ll know. I could care less about ever having a man in my life again, BUT I NEED MY MASCARA. Good Lord. Help me.

Knitting, car talk, and self-help

Mike and Milinda came over for dinner, Survivor and knitting. And drinking, which I think should go without saying. (Judgers: Diet Coke.) (Everyone else: Red, red wine.)

Mike was appropriately impressed with the Kitty Pi. Thank you, thankyouverymuch. I meant to light the grill and make barbecued hamburgers and have a nice dinner for my guests. Instead, I served them the following:

1) One bag of Ruffles Potato Chips
2) One bag of Reese’s peanut butter cups from Easter that were 1/2 off at Ralph’s
3) Alcohol

The key to having a successful gathering is to always get your guests drunk enough that they don’t care what they eat.

In this next pic, Jen looks like she’s wearing the Crystal Palace “Splash” scarf I made her because she loves it soooooo much. Actually, I phoned her ahead of time, “Bring that scarf I made you that you never wear so I can take a picture of it (you ungrateful wench).” And she was like, “Uh, I would wear it if it were, oh, you know, ever colder than 71 degrees (you neurotic wacko).” It’s so good to have friends who understand you.

Jennifer saved me yesterday when I had car issues. Here in California, sometimes you have to get your vehicle smog checked and get a certificate that says you passed the inspection before you can receive new tags. The lottery for who the hell has to get a smog certificate is the world’s greatest mystery. This year, of course it happened to me. OF COURSE. With the way my luck has been this year, I knew as soon as I got the letter from the DMV that I would fail the smog test and have to spend one million dollars and some change to get my Jeep fixed. If it could be fixed. ‘Cause that’s the kind of year I’m having.

This should come as no surprise then:

Also, I discovered something new about myself on this journey of fucking self-exploration I seem to be on because try as I might I cannot avoid this journey, anyway, I discovered that now the way I handle bad news is to cry. Uncontrollably. So when the nice man at the smog check station came out to tell me I had failed the smog test, I cried. Like a baby. Because I am three.

As it turns out, however, being blonde and sad and crying while throwing in a “My husband is divorcing me and I don’t know how to fix car things…” makes people feel sorry for you in a Blanche Dubois kind of way. It’s magic the way they will do ANYTHING to get you to STOP CRYING right now, because really, please, I WILL DO ANYTHING if you just please STOP CRYING LADY PLEASE. The poor fellow at the smog station called a friend at a filling station down the road who can fix my car, and I took it there and he said he can indeed fix it right then and there and it will cost one million dollars but at least I have finally, Thank God, STOPPED CRYING.

However, while I have finally stopped crying (for now) I am stranded in Studio City with no car. For hours. And since I have to spend one million dollars to fix my car I can’t really go shopping. So I called Jen and she came to meet me.

Jen: Where are you?
Me: I’m in the bookstore in Studio City in the self-help aisle.
Jen: Um, ok, anything good?
Me: I’m reading “To Love, honor and betray.”
Jen: Nice.
Me: Also, there’s “Why Men Cheat” and “What Men Are Really Thinking” and my favorite, “Why Men Love Bitches.”
Jen: Self-help is a load of shit.
Me: Don’t you want to know why men love bitches?

And so on.

So she came to Studio City and rescued me from self-help, and we went to Starbucks and drank coffee and smoked until my car was ready. And then I had an epiphany. About men and relationships and car trouble and what I really, really need. (Not that I ever want another relationship, because I don’t, because I am a bitter old hag, but anyway, see fucking self-discovery exploration above, nothing I can do about it.)

You see, I have major car issues about three times a year. Without fail, I will get into a crash/get my car stolen/have a wheel fall off my Jeep and there is nothing you can do to avoid it. I have Bad Carma. This is just the way it is.

In the past when my Bad Carma flared up I would call Mr. X, crying, and he would be completely, utterly UNHELPFUL. Anti-helpful, really. Me: “(sniffle sniff sniff) My Jeep has flames coming from the hood.” Him: “Uh, why are you calling me? Did you call Triple-A?”

Shithead.

Anyway, the point of all this is that Jennifer, who is a tee-tiny little thing and knows just as much about cars as I do (zero) came to my rescue in the exact perfect way that Mr. X, in eight years of marriage, never did. She said the magic words.

“Where are you? I’ll be right there.”

You see, Jen can’t fix my car. But really, how many men can fix your car, anyway? You just end up taking it to a mechanic. None of us has a clue. That’s fine. I don’t need you to fix my car (I have Triple-A, THANK YOU SHITHEAD.) But you need someone to say, “I’ll be right there.” I need someone to say that. It’s so easy. All a man has to do is hear me, on the phone, crying like a little girl with a broke-down Barbie Jeep, and say, “I will be right there. Then we’ll go get drunk.” This is easy, folks. It is not brain surgery.

And yet this was not mentioned in one single self-help book. Self-help my ass.

Ten notes to read. You’ll find some blogs there.

Some whine for my Cheetos

1. The fact that I was wide awake enough to feel obligated to work out.
2. That the video exercise dude promised me “only 10 more seconds” of grueling cardio before nattering on to the chick with the 6-pack abs for at least 30 more seconds, extending my agony for nearly 20 unnecessary seconds; seconds I could’ve used to barf up a lung rather than further damage my heart.
3. That I’m so unaccustomed to exercising I had to pretend to “get a drink of water” so I wouldn’t pass out.
4. My new shoes, one of which makes a crazy stick-clicking noise that can be eliminated only by walking on my tiptoes. Not that I walked on my tiptoes for an extended period or time or anything, that would be CRAZY.
5. The cold. I would very much like to have a fist-to-face conversation with one of those alarmist global warming people right about now.
6. No Cheetos to be found at Workplace.
7. Being overbooked on the work board today, to the point that I was scheduled for 10+ hours. Ha – NO.
8. It is not yet Friday.
9. I am losing our annual cribbage tournament by 23 games.
10. I do not work for one of those companies that gives out huge holiday bonuses.

Why it really needs to rain here

Last night I got home from work and set out to expose my greatest failure as a human being: my complete and utter lack of spatial ability, as demonstrated by my attempt to properly water the lawn.

Now while Jason is some kind of lawn-grid genius who knows exactly where to position the sprinkler for optimal water saturation, I am not. In fact, despite wearing a path into the newly mowed grass from the faucet to the sprinkler after adjusting and adjusting and readjusting, I could not figure out how to place the sprinkler so that only four rotations were needed to adequately hydrate the grass.

After running back to shut the water off YET AGAIN in order to reposition the sprinkler, I decided to just move it while it was still running. And to tell you the truth, I’m guessing that grabbing a running sprinkler is a lot like grabbing a snake’s head. Only wetter and more amusing to the neighbors.

I finally got the front yard sprinkler set up how I liked it. (Actually, the sprinkler was getting more of the street than the lawn, but at that point 15 minutes had escaped from me and I NO LONGER CARED.)

That left the backyard. After I finally positioned the sprinkler in a semi-logical spot, it started to rain.

“Yes, yes, yes!” I thought, envisioning myself dancing through the rain-slicked grass to perform the blessed activity of shutting the water off.

The rain lasted for four minutes.

Which was about half as long as Jason’s speech about my crappy sprinkler placement.

CSI: Kitchen

I cannot figure out why our cats have been attempting to eat the following items:

– White bread
– Freshly baked chocolate chip muffins
– Bakery croissants
– Freshly baked chocolate chip cookies

I don’t know what the deal is. I just know that I now have to hide the above items in cupboards, because despite the plastic wrappers, hard plastic boxes, or industrial-strength Ziploc baggies, it is not enough to deter two felines who obviously have developed a serious carb addiction.

Last night I had put two chocolate chip cookies in a Ziploc and threw it into my lunch bag, stupidly forgetting to zip said lunch bag and place it in a hermetically sealed fortress surrounded by laser security technology operated by rabid dogs. So I was treated to a 1:48 a.m. wake-up call consisting of rustling sounds and tell-tale forbidden activity. On my way to investigate, sans proper eyewear or clothing, I stepped on a cookie that had been freed from its plastic prison, smooshing it into a thousand pieces before finding the other cookie still in the bag, on the floor, surrounded by tell-tale chewed-out holes.

Dental hijinks

Lesson of the day: Dental hygienists cannot receive telekinetic messages while wearing scrub masks.

Yesterday at the dentist, the hygienist asked me if I would have a problem with her using a water-pik to clean my teeth instead of a normal pik. I’m thinking, Why would I have a problem? It’s WATER.”

No, my friends, it’s not water. It’s a unique device that paves a direct neuro pathway into your BRAIN. It hurts – muchly. And I’ve never had any issues at the dentist.

My feeble attempts to send her “ABORT! ABORT!” messages through my brainwaves failed.

When that didn’t work, I used a little body language to get my point across; namely, clenching my fists, breathing shallowly, involuntarily willing my eyes to water, and mentally punching her in the throat and kicking her fallen body. After an eternity in which I died three times, she finally stopped and said cheerfully, “There. We’re done.”

And then she reached for the regular metal pik.

Whoa, Whoa, WHOA, sister. We had a deal! Water pik instead of regular pik, not in addition to.

In addition, she then had the gall to tell me I have the beginnings of gum disease, because a few spots in the back of my mouth seemed “swollen.” I wonder how that could have possibly happened. Any ideas?

To top it off, I had to wait an additional 25 minutes for the actual dentist to come over and poke in my mouth for 2 seconds while two bratty kids in the chair around the wall kept peeking over at me and pointing and whispering and laughing.

But I got the last laugh, because I didn’t have any cavities and Brat Girl had 5. HAHAHA.

They did it where??? ~by Jen Lewis

Now that I have a few books under my belt I’m starting to notice some things about myself. As a writer, I mean ::clears throat:: Obviously, romance authors write what appeals to us—heroes that haunt our imaginations, heroines we enjoy identifying with, locations that we want to hang out in—at least mentally—while we’re writing the book.

And I’ve noticed that my characters like to have sex outdoors.

There, I’ve said it. And the evidence is in print.

In my first book, THE BOSS’S DEMAND, my hero and heroine made love for the first time by a mesquite fire in the dark Nevada desert. In my second book, SEDUCED FOR THE INHERITANCE they make love under a blossom laden tree in one of the hero’s Florida orange groves. And in BLACK SHEEP BILLIONAIRE (out now!) they get wet doing it in a sandy Maine inlet under a summer moon.

I guess I just love the idea that the sexual tension is so taut and snapping and the characters are so wrapped up in each other that they just can’t stop.

Of course, sex outdoors in real life is fraught with problems: mosquitoes, nosy neighbors, grit, biting winds. The classic cliché of lovers going at in a hayloft makes people shake their heads and mutter “but hay is so scratchy!”

Who cares? It’s fiction. If you can’t have sex on a beach in a romance novel, then where the heck can you? I try to soothe potential nay-sayers by pointing out that yes, the heroine in my first book was worried about roaming coyotes and snakes (not until after they were done, of course, but still!). I was careful to point out in my current book that Maine was warmer than usual but that the ocean was still chilly (because the ocean off Maine is NEVER going to be warm), and that yes, they were all sandy afterwards.

And, let’s face it, people have been making love outdoors since the beginning of time. For most of human history, there was no indoors J

Do you enjoy reading about people making love in interesting places? Or do thoughts of the uncomfortable realities distract you from enjoying the scene? Is there an outdoor lovin’ scene from a book that sticks in you mind? One commenter will win a signed copy of BLACK SHEEP BILLIONAIRE.

Jen

Give it to me, baby!

Ha ha. Now I have that song in my head! Okay, here we go:

1. Chocolate or Whipped Cream: Chocolate, preferably in M&M form.
2. Leather or PVC: OMG leather. Well, considering I’m a vegan now I probably shouldn’t say leather. But if I was naughty, (and I am) I’d say leather.
3. Outdoor Sex or Indoor Sex: Why do I need to choose? Can’t I do it both ways? Well, I guess if I had to choose I’d say indoor. You can use props that way.
4. In the Jacuzzi or In Bed? I don’t like to have sex in water.
5. Bad Sex or No Sex: Does bad sex still include an orgasm? If not, then no sex at all.
6. Dominate or Be Dominated: On your knees, bitch.
7. Thigh highs or Bodystocking: WTF is a bodystocking?
8. Fast or Slow: I prefer slow. Again, why must I choose? I guess I’d say slow.
9. Rough or Gentle: Rough.
10. Bite or Suck: I’m a vampire, like Karen.
11. Role play or Reality: My entire life is roll play.
12. Dirty Talking or Dirty Talking To: I like a bit of dirty talking done to me.
13. Edible panties or No Panties: I don’t own any underwear.
14. Spanking paddle or Bare-handed: Paddle, but only if I’m the one doing the paddling.
15. Landing Strip or Kojak: Hm, I guess landing strip. As long as it’s a short runway.
16. Multiple Sessions or One Good Fuck: Nothing better than a good fuck!
17. Moaning or Screaming: I’ll quote Karen: I’m not a screamer. I’m a moaner.
18. Older Men or Young Men: It’s great if he has an AARP membership.
19. Threeway or No Way: Three way.
20. Swing or No Swinging: No comment.

On raising male children.

I wrote this for my main blog and then figured it would fit in pretty well here, so here it is for your dissection.

I’ve read a lot in the radical feminist blogosphere about how radical feminist women ought to refuse to care for male children (funny how this doesn’t apply to say, Biting Beaver or Heart, both of whom have male children who as far as I am aware, raised/are raising their boys into adulthood and in Heart’s case at least, haven’t disowned them).

Regular readers will know I have a son, who is three and a half years old. I made a choice to continue with my pregnancy, using a choice that feminism gave me. If I hadn’t wanted a child, I could have easily chosen abortion, as I live in the UK and it is (still, so far) legal here. I didn’t choose that, I chose to have a child. The funny thing about conception is there’s no telling what you’re going to get. Without being told by one’s sonographer, it’s pot luck as to whether you get a male or female child. Here in Portsmouth it’s against the rules for them to tell you the sex of your foetus; you have to wait until it’s born. And I don’t know about you, but the women I know don’t have switches in their uteri to decide to only carry female foetuses.

So having made the choice to continue with my pregnancy, and having spent nine months carrying my baby, he was born and pronounced to be Orion (rather than Amidala, isn’t he lucky he wasn’t born female with that name picked out!). What would the anti-boychild feminists have had me do? “No thanks, I wanted a girl one, you can take this one away.” Quite aside from the fact that there are already too many babies and children unwanted in the adoption system as it is, I chose to have this child. I do not believe that raising a boychild in itself is an antifeminist act and I’ll tell you why.

One of the problems with a patriarchy is that we are all born into it. Children (and most adults!) don’t even realise they’re in it, and by the time that realisation is made by the few who do so, it’s often too late to undo all the ingrained thoughts, feelings and actions that have been imprinted since birth. Most parents don’t realise the damage that can be done by gender stereotyping, and go along with it because it’s just so normal to them.

Surely then, the best person to raise a boychild is someone who as a feminist recognises patriarchy and its stereotypes and constructs, and can actively work against it to try to raise the men of tomorrow to be unlike the men of today? I’m not saying they’ll be perfect. It might take a few generations to get it right. But we’re not going to destroy the patriarchy overnight either, that too will take decades or even centuries. The two – destroying patriarchy and raising boys into men who recognise and are active in destroying patriarchy – seem, to me, to go together like… well, two things that go together really well. 😛

None of us is perfect. My son will have all sorts of influences on him, going against the feminist upbringing and education he is receiving at home. But I’m not the only one doing this, there are thousands of feminists raising boys, and this next generation will, with any luck, have a hell of a lot more boys-raised-by-feminists than the current one. And then the next generation will have even more, and even more. I’m not saying it’s women’s job to educate men/boys; of course it isn’t. But those of us who, having been given male children by the luck of the draw, decide to do the best we can to minimise patriarchal impact on our own boys should not be vilified.

I love my son. I had a choice and I chose him, and like many mothers I choose to do the best I bloody well can to raise him into a happy, healthy adult. I also choose to do the best I bloody well can to raise him against, rather than according to, the patriarchal stereotypes of the way that boys must be. Right now he’s too young to know that his penis means he’s meant to dress/play/act/behave in a certain way, and I have no intention of telling him any time soon.

Of course there are, and will be increasingly in the future, forces working against me to push him into a gender mould (my ex, his father, being one of them). Like I said, we won’t get it perfect the first time round. But we might change things just a little bit, and then we can pass the banner onto the next generation for them to carry on moving in the right direction.

Raising boys is very much a feminist issue. Boy children are always going to exist; better to raise them into decent human beings than to pass them on for the patriarchy to do as it will. I am utterly fed up of feminists who tell me it’s all about treating women as adults, turning around and telling me what I should and should not be doing according to their narrow view of what is and isn’t good for women. I think raising men who are aware of their privilege is good for women, because who knows – we might just end up with a neutral, equal society one day.