I am cracking up tonight because I just found out that someone put Murdercycle on Goodreads. Someone told me I should put one of my chapbooks on there, but I never did because the last one sold out too quickly, and I thought it would hurt people's feelings if they couldn't get a hold of a copy.
A friend of mine almost ran over a blind person with a seeing eye dog. She was pulling out of my driveway and I noticed something move behind her car. I couldn't see what was going on from where I was standing, and then someone who could see started yelling "oh my God." She said "Oh my God" a few times before anyone knew what was going on, and by a miracle, my friend stopped her car before running over the dog and his master who obviously hadn't seen the car pulling out and had stepped right behind it. If I had seen what was going on, I would have yelled "stop." "Stop" makes much more sense and everyone around you stops when you say it. My friend's windows were down, so she would have heard it, too, and known immediately what needed to be done. On 9/11 in New York, several hundred people died who didn't have to. Women screamed "oh my God," and people who didn't know what they were talking about didn't bother running. When men yelled "RUN" or "Get out of here!" people did so and were spared.
Women often say that they speak a different language than men do. They also often say that men don't share their feelings or don't want to talk about them. I don't know much about men in relationships because I have never dated one. But I only like to talk about things that I've thought about. I like to think and then speak. Sometimes that happens quickly, like "stop" and sometimes it takes a long time, like "I don't love you anymore." When I cannot figure out a proper way to articulate the way I am feeling, I either say something stupid or I don't say anything until I can say what I mean. Women have pushed me to say stupid things on more than one occasion. Even if I tell them that I need to think about things before I actually say anything, they tend to flip out and demand to know what it is I have to think about. But thinking about things more often helps when you need to do it quickly, e.g., a blind person and her dog are about to be run over.
When I see a situation that needs my input, I try to ascertain what needs to be done, and I do it or tell someone else to. Women seem to scream "oh my God" a lot without thinking. A long time ago, I saved a woman's life in Las Vegas. No joke, I was even thanked and pat on the back by cops. I almost didn't get there in time, though, because she was screaming "oh my God" and not "help." "Oh my God" is often screamed when merrymaking, so my first instinct is to do nothing. When she did finally scream "help," it came in the form of me, which wasn't much, but it saved her life.
If my friend's foot had been on the gas a little more, or if the blind lady had been just a little nearer to the bumper, it would have been a bad day, and I don't think it would have been my friend's fault. Of course, the law wouldn't see it my way, but the woman who could not properly articulate what had to be done, stop, would have been more guilty than anyone else because she could have prevented the accident by using her brain a little. "Oh My God" doesn't help anyone.
Someone told me the Lakers are losing. I said, "are they still playing?" He couldn't understand, me being from L.A. and everything, but I didn't even know it was basketball season. Go Lakers.
Sara Mumolo and I are working on a new reading series in Oakland. It's going to be awesome.
I saw an old movie called "McCabe and Mrs. Miller." It reminded me of "No Country for Old Men" in a lot of ways, and I loved it.
I am afraid of the economy.
The economy is killing many dogs and cats who used to be pets of people who could afford to keep them. Animal shelters are overflowing.
Yesterday was Monday, and it was beautiful. High gas prices means fewer cars on my busy street. It's oddly peaceful. It's usually quiet in the summer time when the students go home to their mamas and their papas, but it's even quieter. It's 2:07 AM, and the street is dead silence. How am I supposed to sleep with all this quiet? But during the day, it's nicer than ever. When they raise the gas prices even more, when I am living on Safeway peanut butter and wild berries and apples, my street will be nice and clean and quiet.
Someone will come in and murder me for something valuable, but they will only find scraps of things that look like they might be poems and a half-empty tub of peanut butter from Safeway.
5 comments:
Go Lakers
I remember one year when they won and the fans lit something like 20 police cars on fire, and some people died. L.A. can't handle emotional situations,
I don't think women are particularly bad at articulating the appropriate word in difficult situations. It's just that most people are bad at it and a significant proportion of most people also happen to be women.
American women have been trained by a society that tolerates and encourages an inability to perform as well men. Some women accept that; others don't. I like the ones who don't, but the majority of women I meet are pseudo-feminists who are content with inadequacy. The inability to articulate ideas is a product of having been raised in a country where nothing is expected of them and any inadequacy is considered cute or at the very least tolerable.
I like strong women who have compelling ideas, well-spoken women who want to improve themselves and their positions as much as I do. I have been fortunate enough to have had important women in my life, but most American women have low expectations for themselves. If no one expects you to be the one to help in a difficult situation, why bother learning how to formulate your thoughts and words?
On the whole I agree with your indictment, however, I think you give Men too much credit. Most of them are "content with inadequacy [and] have [no] compelling ideas." In other words, my issue isn't that Women aren't stupid, it's that you point at one mountain (the stupidity of women) as though it weren't twinned by one probably grander & uglier (the stupidity of men). The mountain of male stupidity is, frankly, more likely to fall on & kill you.
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