I followed Wanda Sykes. I performed a ten-minute set after this was shown to the audience.
The audience was about 95% female and 100% feminist. They were there for a film festival. That night's films focused on the history of the women's movement (pre-Gloria Steinem). I learned much. The video of Wanda Sykes and my live performance were for comic relief. It was also an acknowledgement and honoring of the permission we all received (consciously and unconsciously) from the women's movement to speak in our own authentic voice and from our own point of view (which, in comedy, allows for originality and hilarity).
As a comic, it was a real learning experience on selecting material. Often, I got the opposite reaction to bits that I get at comedy shows. They laughed hard at things that get mild laughter at clubs, and less at bits that get a rowdier reaction typically. Overall, they were very appreciative, and several people made a point of speaking to me later. I feel so honored that Fran thought of me. I think I'm still high from that.
After sharing in my blog last Tuesday about being asked to speak and perform at a screening of a film in October, I was then asked by Fran Luck, producer and host of WBAI's feminist radio show "Joy of Resistance," to perform in a feminist film festival that takes place on five Friday nights, and the Friday I was requested for was 9/26/14. She had actually contacted me weeks earlier, but it was to an old email address and I hadn't seen the email. Her boyfriend, who is a writer and poetry friend of mine, reconnected us. I am grateful.
The event continues with different themes for four more Fridays. http://tinyurl.com/mmtn5vm Definitely a nourishing evening.
I find it interesting that in both cases where I was invited as a comic to be a part of these cultural events, it was by someone not in the comedy field. One knows me through acting and writing; the other through the NYC poetry circle.
Something that made me feel happy was there seemed to be much less of a divide between gay and straight women than there was in the 1970s. The togetherness felt so good to me. I don't like the pick-a-team mentality. I need the togetherness in order for me to have a place to feel at home.
"Feeling at Home" by Nzante Spee
In this place that felt like a home of sorts, I was appreciated for what I feel, think, and say rather than tolerated. It's a good feeling.
My recent blogs have shared self-examination on matters of
sexuality.While some readers are
entertained and others horrified, the quieter ones who e-mail me privately are
the ones most grateful that I even am willing to bring such matters into the
light.They are female and usually
feeling lonely in the load they carry.It is what helps me stay on track when I’m having my own doubts about
continuing to write in such an open way.
Pulling
things out of the darkness is what I do.It was necessary for my own emotional survival in life, and it is what
truly helps.It does mean I allow myself
to be open to the world.With that,
comes good and bad.
In teaching, it is such a high to hear the light bulbs going
on in heads.People, many of whom
haven’t had that experience, feel so good when they can see what they couldn’t
before.Just knowing lights can be lit
is life-changing.
Even in my comedy, I often am simply shining a light on what
we do as humans, particularly in heterosexual behavior, how we treat each other
and ourselves.I’m not looking to get my
jokes at anyone’s expense.I think what we
really do and feel deserves looking at and is often funny in a ridiculous
way.Some people, both men and women, seem
to feel uncomfortable and might prefer we don’t examine our lives.Some are very disapproving of my unladylike
ways.Ah, too fuckin‘ bad.Once a woman came over to me after a show and
told me her husband was going nuts asking her if what “that female comic” said
was true and going more nuts as she kept telling him “yes.”I love these stories.But the most touching for me took place when
I was quite new at doing stand-up.I’d
been doing it less than a year, and I was fortunate to be included in a show at
Therapy (a mainly gay male bar in NYC) booked by comic Adam Sank.I was still doing my original 5-minute
set.It took on a lot of heavy duty
subjects in a very comical way.But the
underlying anger of my material was clear, and the path to funny was clear.The audience, mostly gay men and some women
friends of theirs, and I were on the same page from before I got on stage.I was very lucky.I think they liked my look and friendly
demeanor (I’m not a comic that makes you regret sitting up front).Plus when Adam introduced me, they heard that
my comedy was on a feminist radio program (Fran Luck’s “Joy of Resistance”),
and that seemed to be a plus.We were
all coming from a place of oppression.So when I got up there, nervous and shaking, I actually felt liked already.That helped my set go very well.I was proud.They don’t all go so well.Here’s
the touching part.When I went to the
unisex bathroom, which was clean, beautiful, and perfectly lit for looking in
the mirror, a young woman (looked Philippine maybe) looked at me and said that
she was sorry to bother me but that I was great.Then she lost her ability to speak and began
to cry.I was washing my hands and said,
“First of all, you’re not bothering me.And,” referring to her tears,
“I understand.”I dried my hands on my
pants to hurry and hug her.I really did
understand that I touched hurting spots for her.She was grateful I put it into words, but she
wasn’t at a place inside where she could laugh yet.We just hugged.“I really do understand,” I said, without
ever knowing her details or her name.
My then-husband told me, “No matter what you do, it’s always
social work in some way.”
It was the brave women who didn’t shut up and who risked being
thought of as crazy or too extreme who helped me so much in my life to have
hope that life -- even on a woman-hating planet -- was worth living and could
have much beauty in it.It was women
like that who gave me words when I so badly needed to know words existed for
what I was feeling.When there are words
for it, it would make me feel convinced I wasn’t alone because the words would
not exist for me alone.
So here I was being that woman for this pained person.It felt so much bigger than comedy to
me.Comedy was just the avenue that
reached this soul.
I am not striving to limit what I say and how I say it.I had once been the scared first-grader whose
teacher told my grandmother that I was too shy and afraid to raise my
hand.She pointed out that when she
called on me anyway, I knew the answer.Of course the teacher didn’t know I was under daily threat of being
given away to a foster home if I spoke about anything that went on in our
house, blah, blah, blah, so yeah, I was too quiet and too afraid.She got that part right.I’d like to continue growing up and out from
there.It’s not easy but so worth it.
In my adult years, there continue to be special people who
welcome my voice (as opposed to trying to shut me up, and I can’t express how
tremendous that is to me who has felt so suffocated) and continue to help light
my path in ways.One of those people is
Alexandra Jacoby, a woman very worth Googling.And it was at her Vagina Salon, that I was introduced to this
wonderfulness below.
In honor of Women’s History Month, I’d like to help give ourselves
back to us … so much has been stolen
and buried.Vagina owners and vagina
visitors, the next 3 minutes could potentially change the quality of the rest
of your life.
