“The role of the artist is exactly the same as the role of the lover. If I love you, I have to make you conscious of the things you don’t see.” James Baldwin Just now, I texted everyone I have a current iMessage conversation with “Thank you for being human with me”. It is because… Continue reading Serendipitous gifts
Tag: wow
For Kirsten
I told you so There is nothing So precious As a sisterhood That softly cautions Of ones ability To disregard Our profound knowing Instead, to fill His jagged caverns Brimmed in untapped dark With the naive light Of our hopeful Imagination
ANNIVERSARY: Name Day
Simultaneously like yesterday, yet longer ago than it seems, I was about two months into Year of the Nee, my official year of celibacy and no intoxicants. I’d come to embark upon that decision in large part due to my romantic relationships and the patterns I had seen in them, one of those patterns being… Continue reading ANNIVERSARY: Name Day
Full Circle Zita
My signature (nude) aerial silks piece started as a homage to sexual relationship, to not giving up on loving someone, even when you get bucked off. The act began as a physical illustration of the struggle to shed the defenses that bind us, finding strength in being vulnerable, and how sex can contribute to the… Continue reading Full Circle Zita
Listening: The Secondary Trauma.
“If you are a man who is becoming upset/depressed/overwhelmed/hopeless/defensive when you listen to the women in the world/your life talk about their experiences, you need to talk about it. With another man.
I really, really mean this. You absolutely need to talk to another guy. A guy you are friends with and who you trust is ideal.
If you don’t have that kind of guy in your life- and, seriously, you are not alone in that area- then you have the very hard, critical work of figuring out how to make that kind of friendship ahead of you. If you are feeling a restless helplessness over all of this, that can be your challenge.
And if you are a guy who has already figured this out- if you’ve already figured out the circle thing and the male friendship and intimacy thing and how to be supportive of women thing- then my personal challenge to you is to go and find the guys in your world who haven’t totally made this connection, and pull them into your circle. Mentor them. Teach them how to do what you’ve figured out to do.
Seriously, I can’t do that. Your girlfriends and lady friends and moms and sisters and classmates and bosses can’t do that. But you can, and that is absolutely invaluable.
Women need men to learn how to be emotionally connected to other men. We need men to learn how to draw emotional support and nurturing from other men. Not to do that in absence of us, but in addition to us. Because men being isolated and lonely- it really, really is killing us.
Men and women, it is really killing us.”
What’s in a name?
Identity. So, everything, basically. Yesterday I started the transition of my identity from Courtnee Fallon Papastathis to Courtnee Fallon Rex. I tried this name on briefly a while back when I was messing around with choosing one that left me harder to search for but also somewhat easy to recognize. Interestingly, the email account I… Continue reading What’s in a name?
The path to Enwhitenment
This is one of the most brilliantly written, keenly observed social criticisms I’ve ever read.
It rings in part for just about every spiritual white person I’ve ever met, including myself; I both mirror my own misguided aspects of it, and fiercely recognize this as a set of core ideals in SO many people I’ve known in my life;
Known, and deeply, deeply disliked.
I wish I had had this to send them, to articulate my stance for me, back when I still put up with them, and people who choose to be like them.
Behold, the path of #Enwhitenment http://enwhitenment.wordpress.com/
The infirmary
Injured, fed, home. Playing the walking dead game, sitting in the perception that there are worse imaginable things I could be going through, like it were a mental stitz bath. This has let me feel something, other than my mental anguish, my how the fuck could they, my I can’t believe this happened, my why… Continue reading The infirmary
Untitled
A few years ago my dear friend Matt Lewis once mused during lunch about “What you could accomplish if someone just wrote you a check”. I fantasized for a moment, and quickly snickered. Like that would ever happen. Fast forward to now, when I’ve just had one of the most interesting conversations of my life.… Continue reading Untitled
Solidarity
I had a get last night. A pretty big one. A few of them really, but one in particular that brought about a bit of an ‘ugh’ along with the ‘ah ha!’. It came about while reading the rather surprisingly amazing comments on this post, about a female artist who creates a series of self… Continue reading Solidarity