Flowers in the Cold

there is something so cool about having flowers during a season when flowers shouldn't be in bloom. this is a picture of my hibiscus plants situated in my living room. they are, hands down, my favorite flower. the one on the right is burnt orange in color while the one on the left is a beautiful orange chiffon with burnt orange centers.

i see these blooms year round.

jb

Health Scares

8 days is a long time to wait and worry.

This morning we received concerning news from the Faxton Hospital in Utica. A. went to this hospital on Monday for her first ever mammogram. The hospital folks called this morning to tell her that the doctor saw a "suspicious spot of density" on her left breast, and has requested that she return so that additional images could be taken. The problem is that they can't take her in until Wednesday, April 5th.

8 days is a long time to wait and worry.

I'm confident that this is a routine occurence, and will likely turn out to be nothing of concern. However, this request leaves us both in a state of uneasy worry. A. has always had a strong fear of breast cancer because it is so common in her family. Her Nana, and at least 5 of Nana's siblings have had cancer, and A.'s mother also got breast cancer three years ago. This disease is fucking horrible.

8 days is a long time to wait and worry.

jb

Visiting My Peeps

last sunday we returned from a week-long visit with my peeps in wv. we had a great time seeing everyone and nursing my mother back to health. there was something so cleansing and theraputic about this particular visit. the older i get the more i realize what a great family i have. it sounds so trite but there is so much love in my family. in short the barry family is simply good people, and i feel blessed to have them in my life. they are far from perfect, and sometimes annoy the hell out of me, but all in all, i could have had it a lot worse. highlights from my trip:

1. meeting and adopting smith, a fabulous dog discovered in my neighbor's yard. read a's blog for more info.

2. eating meal after meal of southern cooking. it's bad for you, i know, but so damn delicious. what can i say my love for cornbread, sausage gravy, chicken and dumplings etc etc is in my wiring.

3. hugs from my sisters. since we have gotten older we have become much more affectionate, parting company with "i love yous, and hugs." i'm a person who used to be so uncomfortable with such expressions of familiarity and love, but now it seems as natural as a drink of water.

4. getting this great picture of my mom and anne together. for some reason my mother rarely smiles in photographs but i got a picture of her with a. where she seems so loose and carefree, and she's smiling. anne is one of the few people who has this effect on my mom and it's so good to see. and i got it on record.

5. seeing zach and aaron (2 great nephews) prance around in their new tennis shoes. it took me back to being 11 years old and getting new sneakers that you just couldn't wait to go public with. thye definitely had that "new shoe" vibe going on that evening.

6. seeing elliott (aka easy e., aka elroy) my nephew who i have been crazy about since his birth in 1990. we have always been close, and i love seeing how he is transforming into this lanky, mature and interesting 16 year old who looks like my father! he's always been special - so damn smart. he's in the 10 grade now and has been receiving all kinds of college applications from MIT, Duke, Cornell etc because he took the ACT as a practice run and scored really high. in two more years he should be able to get a perfect score on the damn thing. he's got it going on.

7. being rescued by my sister, cheryl, who drove 2 hours from parkersburg to see us. she rescued us by bringing her laptop to my mother's house, where we were living all week without a computer and web access. oh the horror and madness of it all. cheryl was god that day.

8. smelling that clean, mountain air. god, i love the way the appalachian mountains smell. that, too, is in my wiring.

okay, that's it for now. gotta get back to my reading.

Soft Food Saturday

these are our babies scarfing down soft cat food. we only give this unhealthy, but delicious (judging from their reactions) food to them once a week. it never ceases to amaze me of how excited they get, and how them seem to know when soft food will be served. they can smell and sense it before i even open the can. they are like heroin addicts waiting to fix when it comes to "fancy feast" cat food.

our older cat, vic, (the black cat on the right) eats some of it but seems to be more into *the idea*of soft food rather than the actual taste. she has a few bites and then moves on.

our youngest cat, oscar, ( buff cat on the left,) gets very excited when he discovers soft food is going to be served, and sometimes eats quite a bit of it. most of the time, however, he displays the proper amount of restraint.

our middle child, kinsey mitts (grey cat in middle) is an absolute soft food cat whore. she is the true heroin addict, and will eat every morsel in her sight. if they other two cats move away, she seizes their plate as well, and can't seem to relax until she has consumed it all. sort of like me with desserts.

okay, i know this blog entry is lame and somewhat pathetic in that i'm blogging about my cats at 10:30 on a saturday night. i'm just bored after having spent the evening packing for my trip tomorrow. also, i'm just now experimenting with uploading pics on my blog and these were the only pics available on a's laptop, which i happen to be using to write this.

jb

Representin'

lately i've been thinking about political affiliations and the act of respresentin' or being defined by/from a particular political position.

yesterday i recalled a conversation i had with a woman(who identifies herself as lesbian and feminist) in minnesota about an interview with p.j. harvey in *bust* magazine in which harvey went out of her way to dodge the feminist label for herself and her music. the interviewer kept pressing harvey, reminding her that many of her songs have been interpreted as having a feminist perspective and speak to other women in feminist, politically charged ways. p.j. harvey wasn't taking the bait and declared that she didn't identify herself that way, and that she doesn't put labels on her music. while i can understand how harvey's remarks could be offensive or disappointing for some, i applauded her efforts to resist putting labels on her music and herself as an artist. also, as someone who has struggled with the feminist label over the years, i thought her comments at least problemitized the label and women's reasons for embracing and rejecting it.

i grew up in a working-class area, and even though i'm comfortably middle-class and work and socialize within the elite world of higher education, my sensibilities, ethics etc remain working-class. because of this i often felt out of place or disconnected from mainstream feminism, which i felt didn't speak to me or other women like me. feminism always seemed a middle-class affair for white, middle-class women. i understood why some women of color and working-class women rejected the label, and felt more comfortable identifying and working within other social justice realms.

having said this, i consider myself a feminist, but most of the time i have more in common with progessive groups working for social and racial equality than i do with women's groups and organizations, because of class issues, i suppose. when i told the above mentioned woman about p.j. harvey's comments, and that i admired her boldness in eschewing the feminist label, this woman went nuts, going into a 5 minute diatribe about the importance of representin'. i was surprised by the emotion of her response and how offended she was that p.j. harvey could make such statements. listening to her heated argument about the importance of claiming this political identity, i suddenly realized that not all people have problemitized the feminist label or have ever felt disconnected from it. this person was so upset when she heard about the *bust* interview that she couldn't attend an upcoming p.j. harvey show with us, even though she had already bought the tickets. she thought that if she went to the show she would be supporting an anti-feminist, so she came up with the lame excuse of menstrual cramps (i'm not making this up) for not going along.

can i make the assumption that the differences in thought on this issue is one of class? in my experience it's the middle-class, white, liberal feminists who are most upset when someone criticizes or rejects the feminist label. many working-class people (both white and of color) don't seem to get as upset, and have an understanding as to why some women wouldn't identify their political solidarites in this way.

frankly, i'm torn. i guess my position is that i do identify as feminist and queer, but my feathers don't get ruffled when i encounter people who do not. it's important for us to be visible as feminists and as queers. i whole-heartedly agree with this, but i also think it's important to consider who rejects the label and why, and to not be prescriptive in our approach to representin' and defining ourselves by/from particular political positions.


jb, representin' from clint-in, new york.

South Dakota

i love south dakota - particularly the western part of the state. i visited the badlands and black hills areas several times while living in nearby minnesota. this area of the country is one of my favorite spots in the u.s. while visiting south dakota i did all the tacky touristy things: meandering through the badlands national park, visiting the crazy horse monument, driving through herds of buffalo in custer state park, camping in the black hills, experiencing the fascinating weirdness of deadwood, and yes, even aweing at the stone wonder that is mt. rushmore. i've also done some non-touristy things like driving through the desolation that is pine ridge reservation, seeing signs on an old store front that said "no indians allowed." if i close my eyes i can see the vast yellow fields of sunflowers, and smell and feel the dry western air. i'm deeply in love with this state.

because of this, south dakota's recent decision to ban all abortions -except when the life of the mother is in jeapordy -really disappoints and saddens me. all doctors who perform abortions in the state are subject to 5 years in prison. looks like chicks in south dakota will have to go to wyoming or minnesota to terminate unwanted pregnancies. what is south dakota doing? man, they dump senator tom daschle (ala indecision 2004) and all hell breaks loose. but i guess this is not surprising in a state that has signs shortly after you cross the border that essentially send the message that animal rights activists not welcome because the meat industry is the state's livelihood. nevertheless, this is a jolting, bold statement to encounter shortly after you cross into south dakota from minnesota. anyway, this abortion ban will go into effect july 1. they wasted no fucking time. of course the decision is going to be appealed through planned parenthood, whose only office in the state is in sioux falls. let's hope they win, but i'm afraid south dakota's ban is going to set off a wave of similar actions all over the country. roe v. wade is gravely in danger.

one aspect of this that really surprises me is that private individuals are donating money to help the state of south dakota pay for the legal costs of fighting this appeal. the state has set up a special fund for it. one anonymous person has already donated a million dollars. that's right, a million bucks. i didn't know this kind of thing was legal - private individuals give money to a state to help a court case! the religious right will be opening up their checkbooks really wide for this one.

god, this sucks.

jb