Wednesday BARB UP October 10, 2018

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This photo of me is from 2011; I wanted purple and pink hair. And so, I went to Cutler Salon and I got the hair color I wanted. I kept my hair in various shades of pink and purple because I liked it. And the more I stare at the textures, the more I yearn for that color again. It’s a woman forging her path. It’s…different. “Be different” is not anything my mother ever said to me. She encouraged what she knew: get married, have children. Even as a child, that was her ideal. A stable life was a husband, a family. That was reinforced, by sending me to Yeshiva, by reminding me over and over again, to find a husband after high school. As I hit adolescence, a shift occurred, that familiar bite of anger and expression that settles into a twelve year old girl, an awareness that rejected my mother’s way of life. That awareness was embedded in observing her choices. Her marriage, to my father, was not an ideal for me. I observed, in frightened silence, what their life as a team looked like. It was not what I wanted for myself. I didn’t know then, what I know now, that chemistry between two people determines so much, determines your happiness. It didn’t occur to me that what my parents drew out from each other’s personality is what manifested, this dark cloud of toxicity, I didn’t know yet that I could choose a partner that would compliment me, that I would revere and love who would revere and love me and that we could, in building a life together, have one that thrived. I did know I didn’t want what they had, this turbulence. I rejected my mother’s values, at the age of twelve, silently, observing and assessing what I wanted for myself. I chose music—The Clash, Springsteen, Patti Smith— and I chose independence. Those two beacons took me away from what I was force fed, provided me with moxie. I don’t know that my mother ever imagined I’d backpack across Europe at the age of 19 with a best friend or that I’d start a feminist zine (twice!) or that I’d raise a daughter on my own or have a career. But I did all of that, and so much more. Career, the career, oh how it made independence a reality, gave me the life I wanted, molded by my own intention. I don’t have the stability of a marriage; I have the stability of myself, of my life that I’ve crafted, carefully. Even now, with being an independent contractor, when the work comes and goes, I do what I’ve always done:  Keep forging my path.

Tarana Burke: “That we would have a moment that has so much potential and then we end up squandering that potential by having circular conversations that don’t amount to much. That makes me nervous.”

A year of METOO.

I am so ready for Alanis Morissette’s play, Jagged Little Pill.

OMG, Doctor Who and Agent Scully Barbie dolls? Yes, please.

Nikki Haley, blah blah blah.

If you’re between the ages of 27-45, then there’s an HPV vaccine for you.

A different kind of creepy.

Sex stuff.

And now have a laugh with Nikki Glaser.

 

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