People, let's survive this. I can't bear what's going on and how many lives
are being taken. I can't bear the inhumanity of the orange one and his lemmings.
A week and a half ago, my friend Judy was coming to the Bronx
and told
me she also wanted to stop by the front of my building to give me a care
package. I was sure I needed everything
she put in there. It was the
first time in
years that we didn’t hug. L She handed
me two heavy shopping bags and a mask her sister made. The mask is cloth and flowery. It is my dressed-up mask. In the bags: juice, towel paper, wine, toilet paper, tuna
fish, candy, pastas, tissues, witch hazel wipes, vitamins, Clorox, apples,
bananas, soaps, oatmeal, etc. I couldn’t
believe it. I texted her: You spent a fortune! Later, she told me she filled the bags from extra
items she had in the house. Wow. It is such a boost to feel cared about. ♥ Judy has an exceptionally big heart generally. She was once on the path to be a nun. I'm so glad she changed route. She's much more fun as a civilian. It was something about those who feel lust and those who murder going to the same fate that didn't sit well with her. Thank God/dess.
For the past seven days, I have not been feeling well.I go from freaking
out about it to thinking I’m
just sick (which is possible without having the virus).The symptoms have changed every two
days.I looked up the symptoms to see if
they are symptoms of the virus.Some are
and some aren’t.And even the ones that
are can also be symptoms of other things.My breathing is (my) normal.That’s
the main thing, I believe.But for the
past two days, I don’t smell anything – including strong coffee, good weed, my
armpits.I know better than to believe
my armpits smelled the same before and after a shower.Loss of taste and smell are symptoms of the
virus.But then again, when we have a
cold, the sense of smell is affected.Driving
myself nuts is not unique to the virus.I can do that on most any day.
I do feel hunger, and I eat.Grandma would consider that a “very good
sign.”In this case, I agree. ❣
I miss doing comedy shows.I know all my brother and sister comics do
too.If I am a survivor of this pandemic, and if I
get on a comedy stage again, will I still be funny?I miss paid acting gigs (even if it’s sometimes
background work).I need the money. But I wouldn't go to a crowd scene now even if it were permitted.
My buddy Bob (my unofficially adopted brother) did me a big
favor yesterday.It was the last day of
April, and I had to get April’s rent check to the management office.The buses are free, but I was feeling lousy,
so he offered to take it there for me.I
brought the check downstairs to him, came back up, and went back to sleep.Bob is a gift in my life.I always felt God/dess and Grandpa had
something to do with such a gift. 🌈 🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈
In this time of the pandemic, my tendency to be a bit
hermit-like goes
unnoticed.I don’t have
to analyze why I’m like this.
Those of you who know me know that, in general, I try to mind
my business and not look for trouble, but there’s always some drama happening
making me have to look over my shoulder. The internet just told me that single
Asian girls are looking for me.Why?I didn’t do anything to them.Geez.
Over a year ago, I was invited to a Facebook group concerned
with racial equality by someone I knew when I was a teenager.Though we had parted ways way back then, it
wasn’t due to disliking each other.So
over time in this group, we’ve all been experiencing each other in an
intellectual, often heated, way regarding government, racial harmony and
disharmony, the election, and all kinds of matters like that.Sometimes, I just need to post something like
this:
In
the spirit of racial equality, these can be equally problematic.
People were amused.The
man who invited me there was quite tickled.One woman said she was stunned that I posted it.I responded by saying I was glad I still
surprise.But the longer I thought about
it, I felt like it was the same old story.If people meet one in an intellectual setting, it often shocks them that
it isn’t all one is.Yet no one is just
one thing.We are complex beings.
It reminded me of a college boyfriend who met me during the
summer when I was partying.When the
next semester began, he knew I was going nuts to get a certain book that was
hard to find.He told me it probably
wouldn’t count for a huge part of the grade, or something like that.I said that if the professor wanted us to read
it, I felt there may be something in there that I’m supposed to know.He looked shocked and said, “What a serious
student you are!”I was surprised that
he was surprised.I lived on a top-floor
walk-up apartment, often ate cream cheese sandwiches for breakfast, lunch, and
dinner, and had to be my own parents basically.No one was bringing me meals or doing my laundry.I wasn’t able to join clubs in college or be
in plays, as I had to run to jobs to get by.I was in college on purpose, not because others expected me to go or
because I had nothing else to do.I
needed to know things.I guess someone
meeting me getting drunk at a party made it hard to imagine I was hungry for
knowledge that could help me make sense of what I had lived to that point.
Recently, a woman I like a lot wrote and directed a staged
reading of a play she is working on.I
did what I could to help promote it, I attended it, and I participated in the
audience discussion session.Later, when
some of us were in the lobby, she, two other women, and I were talking about it
all.I knew she had been anxious about
the large cast getting it together and about audience attending.So I said, “I’m so glad your cast did a good
job and that the room was pretty full in terms of audience turnout.And you look really nice in makeup.”Apparently that was a big no-no to the other
two women.They looked away and shook
their heads like I had said and your
pussy smells great too or something like that.
So for all of those who think I am such a feminist and so
judgmental and blah blah blah, let me make this clear.I did not trade in my physical self for my
intellect.I did not trade in my
intellect to be sexy and appealing to men who need women to be or at least play
stupid.I own my intellectual self, my
emotional self, my sexuality, my physical appeal, and my spirituality… which
means I am intelligent and do not hide it or boast about it but try to use it
for good, I cry and rejoice and feel really happy and really sad, I laugh big, I
get horny and wish more physically appealing available men were grown and not
stuck in 7th grade about these matters, I enjoy being pretty and sexy and love not
having to be either as I enjoy the freedom to look crappy too, and I feel
connected to most beings in spite of the disconnected society in which I
live.I am equally offended by atheists
who laugh at the faith others have as I am by religious folks who expect
everyone to agree with and be ruled by their beliefs.I have been called “extreme” regarding
teaching issues by a woman who is married to another woman.She didn’t call me “extreme” when I argued
with a religious colleague for the gay woman’s right to marry.Everyone likes my sensitive, humane, and
strong beliefs when it supports them.
As some of you may imagine since I am who I am and my students
are adults, not only do I welcome their whole selves when they come to class, I
respond with my whole self as well.So
my students feel free to tell me things that other teachers may frown
upon.What I get as a result is a much
deeper relationship and the truth.I’d
rather hear an honest “I was hung over” than a bullshit “My aunt died” because
I can work with the truth.My students
are human beings to me just like friends or family are.So I don’t do things to them or talk at them,
but rather with them.I give them the
respect I’d want.Everyone is a human
being as worthy as any other human being is not a new concept to me.My mother instilled my sense of humanity, and
not by lecture or research or any nauseating middle class pretense of political
correctness.(Don’t take offense if it
doesn’t apply to you.)
So yes, I am a feminist, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to
look good.(I like when men and streets
and gardens and my apartment look good too.)Being a feminist doesn’t mean I won’t acknowledge a friend looking fancier
than her everyday look.However, I do
think the amount of national attention on Michelle Obama’s bangs is
symptomatic of something that needs further examination.
I don’t yearn to be a stereotype of any kind just to have
company.I yearn to be the best human
being I can be given the cards I was dealt in life.
And yes, if this woman were someone I know, I’d tell her, “Damn, you look good!”
I was mainly raised by my grandmother.Her focus on looks was more than
average.Though I disagreed with her
much of the time on this and other issues, you didn’t grow up female in my
grandma’s house without a sense of vanity.Though she passed some years ago, I can still hear her disapproval when
I go outside without lipstick.
My grandma was widowed in her early sixties.Years later, I used to suggest she date.Her reaction was typically, “What are you
talking about?! What do I need a man for now?At this age, they want a nursemaid.I don’t want to be anyone’s nursemaid.”I insisted that I wasn’t talking about
marriage or about needing.I’d suggest
she enjoy a movie or dinner with a man.Just dating.I guess that was not
something she considered.When she grew
up, you find a man to marry (not necessarily to enjoy), so you wouldn’t be an
“old maid.”You have sex only with that
person so you don’t get considered a “whore.”You have sex with that person whether you want to or not as your “wifely
duty.”I’m sometimes amazed at how many
women didn’t kill themselves.
I feel the need to include that my grandfather was a good man
and crucial in my early life, but in some ways, I think I got to know him
better than she did.If we want a
healthy society, forcing/pressuring people into certain lifestyles is not the
way. We enter the world whole and shouldn't be made to fall to pieces.
Anyway, when listening to this beautiful young woman with her
beautiful voice, I thought of my grandma who also had a beautiful but
I-don’t-think-nurtured singing voice, and I thought of how happily NOT married
I am.It lifted my mood, so I offer the
same to you.
Last week was a hectic week for me and a long day at
work on Friday.Lots of people are sick
or getting over being sick but still coughing their germs around.I didn’t feel great on Friday night, and I
was glad it wasn’t freezing when I had to walk my dog.By Saturday, my ear, throat, and head hurt,
and I had a chest cold.
I was glad it was the weekend and one without
commitments to anyone else.I did think,
however, of a co-worker who didn’t attend a meeting on Friday due to being
sick.I attended the meeting and got
sick later.Seems unjust.
I managed Saturday with tea, gargling, ginger ale,
and Tylenol.But by Sunday, my stomach
was the focus.Ugh.Switched to peppermint tea.If not for needing to walk the dog, I’d have slept more of Sunday away.In spite of what felt wrong, by evening I was
hungry.I ate oatmeal.
It sucks to be
sick.One of the benefits is supposed to
be not having to feel guilty or concerned about not doing anything.I did feel concerned.I had many things to do.Another benefit is having the opportunity to
appreciate our body’s many functions.I
do.
When I was little and got sick, my grandma* took care
of me.She was quite good at that.She grew up when people dealt with polio, died
of pneumonia and infections, and all sorts of things most of us do not deal
with.I grew up before vaccinations for
many of the things we vaccinate against now.She saw me through measles, German measles, chicken pox, asthma, and all
the colds and scraped knees of my early years.She was very proud that I don’t have one pock mark from scratching.She had me polka-dotted with Calamine lotion
and too afraid of her to scratch.My
mother would buy me Archie comic books and hang out with me when she could.
Being grown and sick means I still have to walk my
dog, buy food, make tea, watch my apartment get more cluttered, etc.I’m whining.But it isn’t the end of the world or anything, and I’ve lived through much tougher circumstances, God
knows.I just wanted to whine a bit. By Monday evening, I was feeling a lot better
though I do have something wrong in my ear.It might be connected to teeth issues or it might be an infection that
is traveling around my body.My worst
thought is that it is something awful from cell phone use.
In the spirit of the
world ending, my apartment continues to threaten to collapse.A few months back, my bathroom and kitchen
ceilings were replaced and painted.Now
there’s a leak from above making a situation where not only will those ceilings
need replacing again, but the wall shared by both rooms will probably need
replacing as well.It is sometimes
difficult to take all this in stride, but again, these are physical problems
that, while very inconveniencing, are fixable.
I normally work most
evenings to supplement my morning job income.Working many evenings really limits my other endeavors.Now I am on holiday break (unpaid) from one
job.This is my chance to try to do the
other things I do.So I am glad to say I
will be performing at the Ooba Lounge in Brooklyn on Wednesday and the Grisly
Pear in the Village on Thursday this week.Next week on Thursday, I’ll be in Johnny Zito’s show at Goodbye Blue
Monday in Bushwick, Brooklyn.If you’ve
been meaning to get to a show, all of these shows are free.And just in case the world ends on 12/21, you
might want to not put this off.
*My grandma's birthday is December 15th. Though she's passed on, I feel her with me much of the time. Happy Birthday, Grandma.
too. If I am a survivor of this pandemic, and if I
get on a comedy stage again, will I still be funny? I miss paid acting gigs (even if it’s sometimes
background work). I need the money. But I wouldn't go to a crowd scene now even if it were permitted.
