i highly recommend the play "The Clean House" by Sarah Ruhl. it's currently at the Tisch theater until Sunday, October 5th. get your tickets in advance through smarttix. i don't witness much theater but this play is worth an evening out.
an excerpt:
Ana:
"People talk about cancer like it's this special thing you have a relationship with. And it becomes blood count, biopsy, chemotherapy, radiation, bone marrow, blah blah blah blah blah. As long as I live I want to retain my own language.
Mientras tenga vida, quiero aferrarme mi propio idioma.
No extra hospital words. I don't want to have a relationship with a disease. I want to have a relationship with death. That's important. But to have a relationship with with a disease -- that's some kind of bourgeois invention. And I hate it."
it's a play about discovering/opening your heart for the perfect joke and love. and some stuff in between.
(some costume consultation provided by Rhea Belle apparel.)
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Thursday, September 25, 2008
what matters.
it's the rebellions that matter.
despite the powers that be and what some may think.
fight the doubts, the resistance, the opposing grain.
that's what makes a rebellion... a rebellion.
imagine a long commercial
cutting in
on a setting sun.
that's what the days are like.
at the end of the day, though
i try to remember what matters.
my true guides are inside my heart
speaking through the gut
with swords protecting my spirit.
i just keep saying, because it is true
.
.
.
stay close to the believers
the passion getters
the joy seekers
the givers of kindness
and to hell with
those
whose
arrogance
prevents
them
from
sharing
or even
knowing
the
sounds
of
the
drumming
rain.
despite the powers that be and what some may think.
fight the doubts, the resistance, the opposing grain.
that's what makes a rebellion... a rebellion.
imagine a long commercial
cutting in
on a setting sun.
that's what the days are like.
at the end of the day, though
i try to remember what matters.
my true guides are inside my heart
speaking through the gut
with swords protecting my spirit.
i just keep saying, because it is true
.
.
.
stay close to the believers
the passion getters
the joy seekers
the givers of kindness
and to hell with
those
whose
arrogance
prevents
them
from
sharing
or even
knowing
the
sounds
of
the
drumming
rain.
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Truth be told.
From the Los Angeles Times
Opinion
Palin: wrong woman, wrong message
"Sarah Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Hillary Clinton. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger."
By Gloria Steinem
September 4, 2008
Here's the good news: Women have become so politically powerful that even the anti-feminist right wing -- the folks with a headlock on the Republican Party -- are trying to appease the gender gap with a first-ever female vice president. We owe this to women -- and to many men too -- who have picketed, gone on hunger strikes or confronted violence at the polls so women can vote. We owe it to Shirley Chisholm, who first took the "white-male-only" sign off the White House, and to Hillary Rodham Clinton, who hung in there through ridicule and misogyny to win 18 million votes.
But here is even better news: It won't work. This isn't the first time a boss has picked an unqualified woman just because she agrees with him and opposes everything most other women want and need. Feminism has never been about getting a job for one woman. It's about making life more fair for women everywhere. It's not about a piece of the existing pie; there are too many of us for that. It's about baking a new pie.
Selecting Sarah Palin, who was touted all summer by Rush Limbaugh, is no way to attract most women, including die-hard Clinton supporters. Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Clinton. Her down-home, divisive and deceptive speech did nothing to cosmeticize a Republican convention that has more than twice as many male delegates as female, a presidential candidate who is owned and operated by the right wing and a platform that opposes pretty much everything Clinton's candidacy stood for -- and that Barack Obama's still does. To vote in protest for McCain/Palin would be like saying, "Somebody stole my shoes, so I'll amputate my legs."
This is not to beat up on Palin. I defend her right to be wrong, even on issues that matter most to me. I regret that people say she can't do the job because she has children in need of care, especially if they wouldn't say the same about a father. I get no pleasure from imagining her in the spotlight on national and foreign policy issues about which she has zero background, with one month to learn to compete with Sen. Joe Biden's 37 years' experience.
Palin has been honest about what she doesn't know. When asked last month about the vice presidency, she said, "I still can't answer that question until someone answers for me: What is it exactly that the VP does every day?" When asked aboutIraq, she said, "I haven't really focused much on the war in Iraq."
She was elected governor largely because the incumbent was unpopular, and she's won over Alaskans mostly by using unprecedented oil wealth to give a $1,200 rebate to every resident. Now she is being praised by McCain's campaign as a tax cutter, despite the fact that Alaska has no state income or sales tax. Perhaps McCain has opposed affirmative action for so long that he doesn't know it's about inviting more people to meet standards, not lowering them. Or perhaps McCain is following the Bush administration habit, as in the Justice Department, of putting a job candidate's views on "God, guns and gays" ahead of competence. The difference is that McCain is filling a job one 72-year-old heartbeat away from the presidency.
So let's be clear: The culprit is John McCain. He may have chosen Palin out of change-envy, or a belief that women can't tell the difference between form and content, but the main motive was to please right-wing ideologues; the same ones who nixed anyone who is now or ever has been a supporter of reproductive freedom. If that were not the case, McCain could have chosen a woman who knows what a vice president does and who has thought about Iraq; someone like Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison or Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine. McCain could have taken a baby step away from right-wing patriarchs who determine his actions, right down to opposing the Violence Against Women Act.
Palin's value to those patriarchs is clear: She opposes just about every issue that women support by a majority or plurality. She believes that creationism should be taught in public schools but disbelieves global warming; she opposes gun control but supports government control of women's wombs; she opposes stem cell research but approves "abstinence-only" programs, which increase unwanted births, sexually transmitted diseases and abortions; she tried to use taxpayers' millions for a state program to shoot wolves from the air but didn't spend enough money to fix a state school system with the lowest high-school graduation rate in the nation; she runs with a candidate who opposes the Fair Pay Act but supports $500 million in subsidies for a natural gas pipeline across Alaska; she supports drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve, though even McCain has opted for the lesser evil of offshore drilling. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger.
I don't doubt her sincerity. As a lifetime member of the National Rifle Assn., she doesn't just support killing animals from helicopters, she does it herself. She doesn't just talk about increasing the use of fossil fuels but puts a coal-burning power plant in her own small town. She doesn't just echo McCain's pledge to criminalize abortion by overturning Roe vs. Wade, she says that if one of her daughters were impregnated by rape or incest, she should bear the child. She not only opposes reproductive freedom as a human right but implies that it dictates abortion, without saying that it also protects the right to have a child.
So far, the major new McCain supporter that Palin has attracted is James Dobson of Focus on the Family. Of course, for Dobson, "women are merely waiting for their husbands to assume leadership," so he may be voting for Palin's husband.
Being a hope-a-holic, however, I can see two long-term bipartisan gains from this contest.
Republicans may learn they can't appeal to right-wing patriarchs and most women at the same time. A loss in November could cause the centrist majority of Republicans to take back their party, which was the first to support the Equal Rights Amendment and should be the last to want to invite government into the wombs of women.
And American women, who suffer more because of having two full-time jobs than from any other single injustice, finally have support on a national stage from male leaders who know that women can't be equal outside the home until men are equal in it. Barack Obama and Joe Biden are campaigning on their belief that men should be, can be and want to be at home for their children.
This could be huge.
Palin: wrong woman, wrong message
"Sarah Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Hillary Clinton. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger."
By Gloria Steinem
September 4, 2008
Here's the good news: Women have become so politically powerful that even the anti-feminist right wing -- the folks with a headlock on the Republican Party -- are trying to appease the gender gap with a first-ever female vice president. We owe this to women -- and to many men too -- who have picketed, gone on hunger strikes or confronted violence at the polls so women can vote. We owe it to Shirley Chisholm, who first took the "white-male-only" sign off the White House, and to Hillary Rodham Clinton, who hung in there through ridicule and misogyny to win 18 million votes.
But here is even better news: It won't work. This isn't the first time a boss has picked an unqualified woman just because she agrees with him and opposes everything most other women want and need. Feminism has never been about getting a job for one woman. It's about making life more fair for women everywhere. It's not about a piece of the existing pie; there are too many of us for that. It's about baking a new pie.
Selecting Sarah Palin, who was touted all summer by Rush Limbaugh, is no way to attract most women, including die-hard Clinton supporters. Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Clinton. Her down-home, divisive and deceptive speech did nothing to cosmeticize a Republican convention that has more than twice as many male delegates as female, a presidential candidate who is owned and operated by the right wing and a platform that opposes pretty much everything Clinton's candidacy stood for -- and that Barack Obama's still does. To vote in protest for McCain/Palin would be like saying, "Somebody stole my shoes, so I'll amputate my legs."
This is not to beat up on Palin. I defend her right to be wrong, even on issues that matter most to me. I regret that people say she can't do the job because she has children in need of care, especially if they wouldn't say the same about a father. I get no pleasure from imagining her in the spotlight on national and foreign policy issues about which she has zero background, with one month to learn to compete with Sen. Joe Biden's 37 years' experience.
Palin has been honest about what she doesn't know. When asked last month about the vice presidency, she said, "I still can't answer that question until someone answers for me: What is it exactly that the VP does every day?" When asked aboutIraq, she said, "I haven't really focused much on the war in Iraq."
She was elected governor largely because the incumbent was unpopular, and she's won over Alaskans mostly by using unprecedented oil wealth to give a $1,200 rebate to every resident. Now she is being praised by McCain's campaign as a tax cutter, despite the fact that Alaska has no state income or sales tax. Perhaps McCain has opposed affirmative action for so long that he doesn't know it's about inviting more people to meet standards, not lowering them. Or perhaps McCain is following the Bush administration habit, as in the Justice Department, of putting a job candidate's views on "God, guns and gays" ahead of competence. The difference is that McCain is filling a job one 72-year-old heartbeat away from the presidency.
So let's be clear: The culprit is John McCain. He may have chosen Palin out of change-envy, or a belief that women can't tell the difference between form and content, but the main motive was to please right-wing ideologues; the same ones who nixed anyone who is now or ever has been a supporter of reproductive freedom. If that were not the case, McCain could have chosen a woman who knows what a vice president does and who has thought about Iraq; someone like Texas Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison or Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine. McCain could have taken a baby step away from right-wing patriarchs who determine his actions, right down to opposing the Violence Against Women Act.
Palin's value to those patriarchs is clear: She opposes just about every issue that women support by a majority or plurality. She believes that creationism should be taught in public schools but disbelieves global warming; she opposes gun control but supports government control of women's wombs; she opposes stem cell research but approves "abstinence-only" programs, which increase unwanted births, sexually transmitted diseases and abortions; she tried to use taxpayers' millions for a state program to shoot wolves from the air but didn't spend enough money to fix a state school system with the lowest high-school graduation rate in the nation; she runs with a candidate who opposes the Fair Pay Act but supports $500 million in subsidies for a natural gas pipeline across Alaska; she supports drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve, though even McCain has opted for the lesser evil of offshore drilling. She is Phyllis Schlafly, only younger.
I don't doubt her sincerity. As a lifetime member of the National Rifle Assn., she doesn't just support killing animals from helicopters, she does it herself. She doesn't just talk about increasing the use of fossil fuels but puts a coal-burning power plant in her own small town. She doesn't just echo McCain's pledge to criminalize abortion by overturning Roe vs. Wade, she says that if one of her daughters were impregnated by rape or incest, she should bear the child. She not only opposes reproductive freedom as a human right but implies that it dictates abortion, without saying that it also protects the right to have a child.
So far, the major new McCain supporter that Palin has attracted is James Dobson of Focus on the Family. Of course, for Dobson, "women are merely waiting for their husbands to assume leadership," so he may be voting for Palin's husband.
Being a hope-a-holic, however, I can see two long-term bipartisan gains from this contest.
Republicans may learn they can't appeal to right-wing patriarchs and most women at the same time. A loss in November could cause the centrist majority of Republicans to take back their party, which was the first to support the Equal Rights Amendment and should be the last to want to invite government into the wombs of women.
And American women, who suffer more because of having two full-time jobs than from any other single injustice, finally have support on a national stage from male leaders who know that women can't be equal outside the home until men are equal in it. Barack Obama and Joe Biden are campaigning on their belief that men should be, can be and want to be at home for their children.
This could be huge.
Gloria Steinem is an author, feminist organizer and co-founder of the Women's MediaCenter. She supported Hillary Clinton and is now supporting Barack Obama.
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Rhea Belle apparel... the beat goes on.
i just received the following email today!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
"I received the items I ordered, and I love them -- Now I'm wondering about another...
Thanks again -- Your clothes make me feel so good......
Mary"
"I received the items I ordered, and I love them -- Now I'm wondering about another...
Thanks again -- Your clothes make me feel so good......
Mary"
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
a wordless narrative #2.
a train ride.
towards friends, gregg and marisol.
rich blue skies.
sun kissed wood.
licks and jumping fur.
cool water in evening light.
a love story on a rippling sheet under stars and amidst crickets and birds. and a fire.
chocolate cake and beer. (yes together) after steak and garden greens.
sleep.
and then.
morning swimming. alone. floating. and summersaults.
taking it in.
a puppy named chica.
a smooth sweet flirty dog named chulo.
and elegant maya. 15 years old. sleeping. always. and dreaming of play and running and treats and all the hugs and kisses in foreverville where comfort and endless memories with her cool mama, marisol await her.
and gregg. i wrote a poem for him once. or twice. a friend for life. years ago he walked deep in the woods with me. he, a shovel in his hand. me, my dead cat's body in a back pack. we buried her together. he was the only one near that i trusted. he lost a shoe (a dress shoe at that) down a steep hill while climbing towards the best spot. we buried her on a hill near a stream. i planted poppies. we found his shoe.
and then a train ride back to brooklyn. to "meat".
enjoy the show.
towards friends, gregg and marisol.
rich blue skies.
sun kissed wood.
licks and jumping fur.
cool water in evening light.
a love story on a rippling sheet under stars and amidst crickets and birds. and a fire.
chocolate cake and beer. (yes together) after steak and garden greens.
sleep.
and then.
morning swimming. alone. floating. and summersaults.
taking it in.
a puppy named chica.
a smooth sweet flirty dog named chulo.
and elegant maya. 15 years old. sleeping. always. and dreaming of play and running and treats and all the hugs and kisses in foreverville where comfort and endless memories with her cool mama, marisol await her.
and gregg. i wrote a poem for him once. or twice. a friend for life. years ago he walked deep in the woods with me. he, a shovel in his hand. me, my dead cat's body in a back pack. we buried her together. he was the only one near that i trusted. he lost a shoe (a dress shoe at that) down a steep hill while climbing towards the best spot. we buried her on a hill near a stream. i planted poppies. we found his shoe.
and then a train ride back to brooklyn. to "meat".
enjoy the show.
Friday, August 29, 2008
unleashed.
the new designs have been unleashed. my description for this garment:NEVER before has a mastectomy garment been offered that actually embraces the transformed body. This dress was designed solely with my body landscape in mind- a single right side mastectomy. The rich raspberry tie gently wraps the flat chocolate terrain- protecting, embracing and empowering it with style. Radical times call for radical measures. Thousands of women walk the sidewalks with post mastectomy bodies hiding them with prosthetics, frumpy over-sized garments and fear. I refused painful, potentially harmful reconstruction and the humility I find in the use of a prosthesis. I'd rather adorn my deserved body with beautiful garments and confidence and this piece is the first to be available for sale with such a brave bold statement.
If you haven't had surgery it's still going to be fabulous on you!!! Just fabulous. Wear it with glorious support for all the women with transformed bodies and spread empowerment. It will be available in other colors soon. But I'm in love with this combo! The wide tie can be made to embrace the left or right side. Please specify upon purchase.
"A reasonable man adapts himself to his environment. An unreasonable man persists in attempting to adapt his environment to suit himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man." George Bernard Shaw
***
is this "in your face"? you bet! do i care? what do you think? but i will not let 30+ years go by again and passively sit and wait for "time" to forgive my body politics. i wish Audre Lorde were still with us to perhaps witness a day free from oppressive ideologies and submissive practices based in fear.
i simply don't want to be "nearly me" or "nearly you"
Please pass the knowledge of Rhea Belle apparel around! or go shopping for yourself. it's really not about the sales. it's about unleashing the lovely sweet REBELLION!!!!! a rebellion created for ALL women- so if you ever need to make those hard pressed decisions regarding what to do with your body if diagnosed with breast cancer you'll have choices. choices based in your personal ideologies NOT fear of social rejection.
and i'm not the only one wondering "if thousands of women are having mastectomies a year... where are they? where are "the women like me"?
(i'm wearing this number this weekend. i'll post photos as i'm always getting comments like "let's see YOU in it". so ok. ok already.)
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