It is a hard day.

Okay, I've started and deleted a sobbing post about how hard it is to leave Kansas. Even though I'm going to *iowa*. Even though all of these changes are good changes and things we have wished and dreamed for.

We have found an incredible community here with deeply beloved friends. Friends who catch us and have caught Khubz. They are our family and have stood by us through too much travel, pneumonia, comps, weaning, crazy woman juice, a second Bush term. . . You name it.

I have started and deleted this post so many times because I have way too much work to finish up today to be crying all day at my computer. So instead let me reaffirm that I am actually really good at holding on to people across distance, that no one will be escaping my continued kvetching and that you are my family and I am *serious* about family.

You all know who you are.
Know also that you are loved.

Caption Contest!

Scully has turned in a major, MASSIVE, life-changing project. Understandably, this means there's been some stress in the house. She turned it in yesterday with two minutes to spare. (I may have had something to do with this. She finished up her paper and asked me to email it to a friend for printing while she showered. I *may* have emailed an old draft accidentally. This was discovered when the friend, WHO SAVED OUR LIVES, called to report that the emailed copy had yellow highlighting all over it. We raced back to the house to resend. All this because there hadn't been enough drama, right?)

We both came home and broke into HOWLING SOBS.

All this is to say that I have nothing to contribute to the blogosphere except a caption contest. Another friend works at a religious hospital and gets emails with inspirational photos like this below. Um. . . Super Creepy, she says to me in an email. We can do better than that!

Got captions?

spin or spinning?

We had a very good staff meeting today that included an exercise where we developed a continuum. . . "least harmful to women" to "most harmful to women." Our facilitator asked us about a specific action (like getting a woman drunk to "loosen her up") and we had to discuss where to put it on the spectrum.

Okay, getting a woman drunk so it is easier to rape her goes right under "most harmful." That "most harmful" category got pretty full, actually.

But there were some things that we had a lot more discussion about.

• Referring to your partner as "my bitch"
• Reading maxim magazine
• Telling blond jokes

Lots of these depend on the context. Is it a group of women's studies students reading maxim to deconstruct ideas about gender? Well. . . it could be. . .

So it was actually a good meeting with lots of good discussion. Then the final action discussed was "Talking to a group of your friends about your sex life, in detail, and what your partner did."

I sunk down in my chair.

The discussion started with images of men bragging and sharing ideas to coerce a woman in to doing something she didn't want to do. "Yeah? Well I got my bitch to give me a. . ." and I do understand that image and it does creep me out. But this was the image in my head:

Picture the ff and a handful of sisterfriends in a coffee shop. "Guess what we did?! And it was awesome! And I never would have ever, ever thought dangling off a hammock suspended over a fire pit while eating a persimmon would be erotic but it really was!!" (or insert what you will--in the sentence I mean)

And then the amigas would reply with their adventures in hammock suspension, what worked or didn't, whether they were scared the hammock would rip out the drywall, what music was playing, figs or persimmons or pomegranates. . . And there would be much laughing as we revisited adventures driving along an interstate and accidentally throwing the car into neutral. Or maybe someone has a story about getting it on in a wooded grove until they were interrupted by some Britteny spaniels and a mortified dog owner. I know you all have your own hammock stories. . .

So what makes that different than a group of guys bragging or being creepy?

Well, my intent is not to humiliate my partner. And the impact is different. . . My sisters would never take the information I share and use it against Scully or against other women or against their own partners. Scully is not endangered by anything that I share. She will not be exposed to other people coming up to her and expecting that she engage in hammock suspension acts with them.

But there's this boundary violation piece that is not as easy to dismiss.

In truth this info sharing is sometimes imperfect. Scully is often embarrassed at the idea that the sisters really do know intimate details about our lives. And she is sometimes uncomfortable and will punctuate discussions and/or tra-la-las with an edict that "this is not to be discussed at sistercoffee!" And she has shared that it sometimes feels like our intimate lives and even (or especially) our arguments are all acted out on a stage filled by an audience of my sisters. And she has asked for a bit more privacy from sistercoffee or from sisterfriend emails or from the blog. . . Especially with October coming, if you know what I mean.

So it all really leaves me with this sense that I am tangled up on that continuum in some problematic ways. I'm not convinced, actually, that Maxim is much different than other media I take in. I like to think I have an "informed lens" for how I view media from the Democratic National Convention to fruit compote recipes (or "porn" as some call it) but, truthfully everyone thinks they can see the spin. They just don't feel themselves spinning, right?

But there is no self-flagellation in this post. Just some reflection and a thanks for being able to engage in a thoughtful conversation.

October will be here soon. I'd hate to mess that up.

Ridiculously hormonal

Let's just start a short list of what's making me cry today.

Scully told me that a Jamaican Olympian won the 10 meter dash and set a new world record. Crying yet? Nope. Just fine. Then she said that he kept running past the finish line and over to the stands where he hugged his Mom. Sobbing, Sobbing, Weeping!!!

Um, okay. . .

Driving to work I pop in some Jesus Christ Superstar. This does not in and of itself make me cry but listening to it makes me think of two things: Les Miserables (the mere thought of which is enough to make me cry and does) and my sister, now known as Tia Lila (crying, crying, crying.)

So we're off to a good start, I tell Scully when she calls me with the drop off report.

I then arrive at work. A very good friend who works here has just accepted a new job and even though it is a wonderful opportunity for her and she will absolutely kick ass at it. . . It does mean that I have begun the grieving process. Really, there are days when I was struggling and I could simply head down the hall and sit in her space. I'm not really ready to give that up & am doubtful I'll ever be ready. So we can expect more crying.

Best part of being pregnant? It is a great excuse for a woman who (even when she is not pregnant) is completely, thoroughly and ridiculously hormonal.

traveling like a mfcker

I have been on the road constantly for the last month. I know that this should technically mean I would be blogging MORE (from hotel rooms) but it actually means I have been exhausted and get to sleep as soon as possible.

I'm still traveling a lot. Tomorrow & most of next week. So bare with me. While you're waiting, send some good vibes out. I can't tell you where to send them, exactly, because those aren't my stories to tell. But if you send them out in to the universe in the next couple of days they won't go to waste. I promise.

love, the ff

in touch with the world today.

it's all bad news over at democracy now (which is actually indicitive of the what's going on in the world)

feeling sad today.

If you'd like to join me check out:

Democracy Now's report on how Monsanto is profiting from food scarcity across the world.

Anti-racist Parenting's post on how black children are the blue light special at adoption agencies.

This American Life's explanation (in plain language) of the housing crisis and how we are all fucked.

And oh, I almost forgot, happy fucking birthday israel (graphic pics disclaimer)

So I know I'm feeling anxious today & that tends to send me further in to my head. And I know there's lots in the world to feel sad about.

On the other side of that, here's a pic from earth day. Khubz was given a daffodil and pretty immediately the bloom fell off. That's okay, though. Because it was really the stem she thought was beautiful. (thanks to amanda for the pic!)

Good Idea. . . Bad Idea

Good Idea: Scully & I just taught Khubz to raise her fist in the air when we shout "revolution!"

Bad Idea: Binging on icecream because I'm anxious about not having gotten my period

Good Idea: Greeting poets all month long! Please go put some Lucille Clifton in your ears. You can thank me later.

Bad Idea: Continuing to eat my lunch at a minority health disparity conference after the lunchtime speaker said "The only threat to this country's national security that is greater than terrorism is. . . " (any guesses? You guessed!) "Obesity."

Good Idea: Leaning over to my friend and saying "I fuckin hate being a double threat." It's true. My sister reminded me that they'll never let me on the plane now.

Bad Idea: Making a move towards the carrot cake even as the woman continued

Good Idea: Scully & I had been having a text conversation all morning about which of us was having a harder day. After I sent her the above quote I got a very sweet "you win."

Bad Idea: Attending an ISM/anti-oppression workshop at that same conference where the speaker's main point was "well it (racism) goes both ways"

Good Idea: Getting up and leaving the workshop before my fucking head exploded. No it does not actually go both ways. NO it is not all about mean words & hurt feelings. It is actually about infant mortality rates and poverty and deportation and rape and who does/does not have a grocery store on their side of town and who can/cannot get onto the fucking bus which stops running at 7 anyway and whether Scully & Khubz & I are all safe together and it is not is NOT is NOTNOTNOT about whether some person of color said something mean to you when you were in 7th grade. Jesus! (as I said, very, very good idea to leave)

Excellent idea: Getting the girlchild in bed on time while she was still in a good mood and coming downstairs to do some writing.

Even more better excellent idea: I'm taking a poetry workshop later this month at the public library. By myself.

An additional very great idea: Khubz & I are going with some good friends on an AIDS walk (at toddler speed) on the 12th.

Also a quite stellar idea: Khubz & I are escaping to iowa this weekend. Scully will study her patootie off and we'll all get to play on Sunday (inshallah) when we get back.

Good for the earth though possibly a bit trying for me idea: I am carpooling with a work friend up to Iowa. She's lovely & I'm dropping her off at her niece's house (her niece who has baby goats that Khubz will love to see) but I'm quite used to making the drive with just me & my sleeping girlchild and my ipod, fully loaded with nerdy public radio shows. Still, how can you argue about carpooling?

ifiwerearunonsentence

it would go something like this

sick yesterday off to texas tomorrow for the rebirth of jesus headache today lots of training this last week not bad pretty good some parts went quite well really throbbing headache really found out that stickers can be worth $600 if they're on your prescription for crazy woman juice the whole afternoon was spent training on sexual assault makes me feel fragile and mad and crazy i am unbelievably excited about spending the next 4 days with my woman and my daughter unbelievably excited about seeing so much of Scully and having us together as a family with her family really pretty amazing really haven't been out & about in the blogosphere lately can't wait to catch up Grandma got Khubz a wagon & she loves it & I assembled it (totally proud of my tool-wielding, femme self) time to go take some Tylenol pick up my girl and love her and love her and swing her around we are so going to try on my next cycle crazy woman juice is on its way $3000? no problem i am ready for my baby now

Fishnets & Fruitjackets

Fruitnets
Originally uploaded by digicla

you can tell when
the fishnets are
all for show

no intent behind
the loops and strands
hanging loose

untied

but then there are
times

such bindings are
not dramatic

& you are sure
as she is

& you wonder,
how exactly would i
unhook all that lace

or maybe just
go through it

bite

right into

the zest

It happens, right?

Quick call in to clc to check on Khubz. She is fine, she is happy, she is healthy, she is enjoying herself, she is playing with toys, she had a good time going outside, she is safe and she is well-rested. What more could two mommies want?

"did you know that she loves mustard?"
"no. . ."
"she loves mustard! We had hotdogs today for lunch and. . . "
"Did Khubz eat hotdogs?"
"Yeah"
"Oh, because I packed her lunch today and we don't eat hotdogs."

Lots and lots and lots of apologies from Kara, the lead daycare provider. She's really, really, really sorry and I really, really, really believe that it was just an honest mistake. She's got how many kids and they're hungry and it's chaos. I'm not mad at her but I am perturbed.

Now I'm not crazy. I don't fear that Khubz is going to suffer dire health consequences because she had a hotdog for lunch. I'm not worried that the pork she consumed will now preclude her from going to heaven. I am not terrified that she's had a hotdog and next she'll want to sing the star-spangled banner. So, please, know that I am not being ridiculous.

I am not turning in my notice at work so I can stay home with her. I am not looking for a new daycare. I am not designing a "no pig, please" t-shirt for Khubz to wear to daycare.

And since I am not flying off the handle I do think that means I get to rant about my f e e l i n g s . . .

The problem with all of this is that it represents the rub of my family against the majority. This is not the first conflict (duh) but it is one of the first where the primary point of impact is Khubz as opposed to me or Scully. And she is encountering this conflict in the absence of her mommies, in the absence of anyone who even knows there's any conflict at all. Because we represent the conflict and they are simply being the majority.

I don't want her eating hotdogs. Not because there is anything inherently destructive about one hotdog but because I want us, our family, her mommies, me & Scully to set the norm. They already set the norm with all of the rest of her daily environment: the music, the books, the rules, the language, the toys. And we have her in care there because we feel like their norm is generally compatible with what we want. We like their rules, their toys, their music. . .

But there is something about the way Khubz's world tastes.

It is wonderful to share food with other people & find out what their world tastes like. It's not a big deal that she ate a hotdog. I fully expect to delight her with funnel cake at the county fair and beef ribs at the rhythm & ribs festival. It is her everyday, her norm, her standard, her landscape. . . That's what I insist on keeping in family.

Please know that I am not hoping to keep Khubz in a bubble.
I am not delusional about all the dominant/crap I consume (just wait for the upcoming post on the library book sale.) I liked this whole rant better when it was punctuated by beautiful pictures of spices.

Almost midnight

It is almost midnight. Why am I up?

• Is the girl up, puking her guts out or constantly chewing on you for comfort? no.


• Are you madly trying to finish something and had to take a break and am now procrastinating? no.


• Are you out of laundry and desperately waiting for the "low-heat cycle" to actually dry your clothes? no.


• Did you and your partner get into another endless "the lesbians are talking themselves to death" conversation and you couldn't fall asleep because you were filled with conflict? yes to the first part. no to the second.


• Are you staying up all night because it's now Ramadhan and you want to eat everything you can before the sun comes up? Uh. . . yes, it is Ramadhan but no I'm not on an all night binge if that's what you mean. Thanks for the idea, though.


• Are you staying up all night because you have a constant cough and the only things you have in the house are all labeled with warnings that "good mothers certainly wouldn't take anything with this active ingredient while they were nursing." Sort of. Okay, yes.
  

Truth be told I even called a pharmacist to plead with him. Plleeease, can I take this? Pleeease? "Sure" he reassured me. "As long as you don't care what happens to your kid." What does he know? I'm calling my dr in the morning.

Really, though, this isn't even the post I wanted to write. The post I wanted to write was more like "Discoveries!"

• Khubz loves to feed herself. Her top eateries include spiral noodles, shredded sharp cheddar cheese, watermelon, cake (ha ha), green beans, pinto beans, black beans and peas.
• Khubz made her first attempt at escape. I was cooking, Scully was putting dishes away. We looked down and the girl had just crawled out onto the deck. The sliding glass door was open and Khubz made quick work of opening the screen door. (I guess that's why screen doors have "locks" on them.) "The human child is getting away," I mention to Scully. "We have to worry about her sneaking out already?" Scully replies. All this while Khubz headed for the hills.

and it is that same human child who has now woken up and is asking for milk. when did i say i was going to wean her? hm.

ramadhan mubarak.

Vomit, part ii or iii or iv

More vomit.

Much, much more.

To her credit, Khubz looked much more upset about puking on me than she ever had before. It was sort of a slow-motion, marathon vomit. She was nursing and swallowing lots of mucus (again) and sat up looking at me like I'd said "I'm thinking about transitioning to a man" Calm down, folks, this is not meant to shock you with transphobia. it's meant to shock you because of my great antipathy (some would say loathing) of masculinities.

So she had this surprised, confused look on her face. She sunk her chin down into her neck and up came round one of vomit. I'd been nursing (most of the day) and so I didn't have a shirt on.
Try to be a good mommy, I tell myself, and banish both my sigh and my grimace. "You're okay. Are you okay? You're okay. Are you okay?" Each of these was punctuated by another round of vomit from the child. At that point it was a two mommy job.

Scully was downstairs tackling Mt. Laundry so I had to stomp on the floor to get her attention. Classy, I know. Every woman loves to be interrupted while doing laundry by her partner banging on the floor. And every woman is even more overjoyed when she comes up from the basement to find her partner covered, covered in vomit and her infant child still heaving. That same every woman feels completely fulfilled when (once the child is done & wiped down) she gets to return to the laundry with more dirty clothes--especially since these ones had the aforementioned snotty, milky vomit all over them.

Khubz and I plunked down in the bathtub together. We hadn't done this in a while. It was sort of nice because she loves to splash and play in water. I just had to pretend that I wasn't in the tub to wash off vomit and bathe in water that she was likely peeing in. When did I get so squeamish?

Oh well. She cried for an hour and a half before falling asleep. It was awful. I'd rather be vomited on.

(note to future self, don't forget to link to that statement in future vomit-related posts.)

On another note:
The poet of the day is Sonia Sanchez

I'm listening to the Sweet Honey song where she reads this poem over their singing. Marvelous.

I do so much better with poetry.
It is the opposite of a crying baby, a political campaign, horns honking outside or the musak i'm subjected to while being on hold.

If anyone cared

I love stealing ideas. Especially from this blog.

Letters I would write if anyone cared:

Dear uncle bill,

i really wish we would have stopped by at least once. We drove by your town 4 times a year for the last 6 years and I just never stopped. Thank you for stopping by in my dream to meet my daughter. i'm so sorry. i just didn't think it was possible for you to die.

missing your presence in the world, Jannie

============================================

Dear Super-wacky, anti-interracial marriage, woman&immigrant&homo-hating evangelists,

please stop wasting paper by jamming your weirdo pamphlets into our front door. Our recycling bin fills up fast enough as it is. My partner already knows jesus and has emergency contact information in case jesus gets lost anytime in the future. As for me? I hate your god.

Sincerely, my soul.

p.s. i go down on women. prayerfully.

=============================================

Dear hoa supreme overlord,

what is your fucking problem? you think we have more money to pour into your shifty/shitty pockets so you can pay your son $70/hour to mow the grass? don't you know people live in townhouses because they are trying to save what little money they have? if you raise our gddm hoa fee we will be paying 1/4th of our housing costs to satisfy your neverending, ever-escalating appetite. If we did not have to pay your stupid fee (or if you had left your stupid fee at the rate it was when we bought this place) we would have our house paid off 10 years sooner. You are an ass.

sincerely, two women who do, in fact, own a hammer

p.s. that fucking dead squirrel is still in the yard behind our house. i am not picking it up. eventually you or your offspring will have to mow the patch of grass where it is decomposing. if that lawn mower sprays chopped up decomposed squirrel bits on my deck i will personally mail you all the road kill between here and iowa on a monthly basis (along with our check)

=============================================

Dear white canvas bag with pictures for my in-laws and with Sally's sonicare toothbrush all of which I was supposed to put in the mail,

Where are you??

sincerely, off to print more pictures and buy a toothbrush

p.s. are you with my old debit card? or with my favorite measuring cup? or with my flash drive?

=============================================

Dear daycare provider,

I am sorry we don't pay you more. Your work is to protect and nurture our beloved. You certainly deserve to be paid more. But we don't pay you more. And so you have to take more kids. And it is unfair of me to grimace when I heard you were taking another infant. But I did. And I can't hardly stand to think about it now. If we could pay you more we certainly would. I am so grateful to know that you love our girl and to feel secure in knowing that you would never hurt her. Even though she is almost one she is still a baby. I don't want her to be one of a gaggle. (unless she was one of a gaggle of brothers & sisters.) The kids she spends all day with are not her family. We are. How can I feel so indebted to you and so entitled at the same time? How can I feel such relief and such resentment? I know this is unfair. I know women are trained to compete, dislike each other, resent one another. I am profoundly thankful to have Khubz and always grateful she is with someone who loves her--even though she should be with one of her mommies.

sincerely, umm-Khubz

p.s. i know that none of this is your fault. i hope you don't think it's my fault either.

===================================

Dear Mo,

Please, please, please ditch Sydney. She is a two-timing bitch. You & your neurotic ways deserve better. Remember Hillary? She's got a kid now! Imagine all the anxiety you can channel into being partnered with a woman who has an infant! Endless possibilities!

sincerely, adoring reader

p.s. stay far away from Clarice. Do you hear me??

=========================================

Dear menses,

Uh. . . WOW. Welcome back! How did that happen?

sincerely, weaning-is-doing-something

p.s. the shedding is a good start. can you mention something to the ovaries about follicle development? just thought I'd ask.

Tightwad heros

I have many. One of them is my sister, Joe. She is getting ready to put her house on the market so she & her husband & her 1 yo son can move into a 2 bedroom apartment & save money. Because they don't want their son in daycare. This means that she is putting together a birthday party for a one year old on $23. They don't have long distance on their phone. They share one cell phone. They are a one car household. (this means her husband is home with their son and no way of escaping or running to the store etc.) They don't have cable. And their diet is largely organic food. I have no idea how they do this. Unfortunately, she's stopped updating her blog so I can only show her off with an old post.

They don't think we're evil, or anything, for putting Khubz in daycare. But they don't believe in it for their son. I don't believe in it for my daughter--except it really is the best option for my family right now. Don't worry, I'm in touch with my cognitive dissonance.

We want to have more kids, inshallah, and I need really, really good insurance when we're trying to get pregnant. The insurance I have at my current job is excellent and I have an amazing amount of flexibility in terms of my work schedule. All this is to say that I don't usually feel beaten down by daycare guilt on a daily basis anymore. But I do feel like we need to maximize our savings while we're a two income family.

So what are our actual numbers? I know this is "tacky" but remember that women have been taught not to talk about money and never to tell each other the truth. I post this in the name of economic justice! (also, i know that public declarations help shore up someone's resolve when they feel themselves slipping. i'm not about to list my weight so you'll all have to suffer through our budget.)

• 3600 : income after taxes/withholding/medical insurance

• 775: mortgage + stupid hoa fee which they're threatening to raise--bastards.

• 190: gas, water, electric (huge utility bills for an interior townhouse! Mostly because I am a sucker about running the airconditioning and we really, really need new windows to be well insulated)

• 200: landline (why do we still have this, Scully?), 2 cell phones, DSL

• 30: basic, crappy cable

• 500: daycare (how can something that costs so much pay so badly?)

• 250: my new car

• 200: our new car insurance bill

• 300: student loan repayment

• 250: gas & tolls (this incl. a monthly ia trip and semimonthly trip to tx)

• 100: tx loan repayment

• 200: savings

• 250: household goods (if it's not parchment paper, it's toilet paper or computer paper or toothpaste or buttpaste or--god save us--diapers)

• 280: groceries. This is high for a family of two adults and an infant but we're trying to buy organic including the very pricey organic meat. And I am a sucker for beautifully merchandised fresh foods. It does also budget for eating out one meal a week.

This leaves us $75 a month if we're doing everything right.

It's not bad because the above numbers on the loans are our goals, not always our actual minimum payments. So we have some emergency wiggle room if desperately needed. It includes an additional $75 towards our house, an extra $100 on my car all trying to get our debt ratio down. It also has savings built in. So where's our cash at the end of the month?? (sigh)

To assist me with my perspective:

• TANF benefit for a family my size = $ 429/month


• Minimum wage in Kansas = $ 5.15/hr or $892/month

Then there's some additional perspective:

• KS Powerball payout next week = $ 123,000,000.oo

Flashback: The Dog Story

See where nostalgia gets you?
This was an email from Octoberish of 2005 (that long ago??) A couple months before I got pregnant with Khubz.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hello beloved family & dear, dear friends,

What is going on? Your good, though reclusive, friend has emerged temporarily from her isolationism with a story of unwavering and wavering love, faltering devotion and (ultimately) compassionate indifference. Please do not fret. This is a happy story.

Before I launch let me say that I miss seeing everyone, care very much about you all and hope to permanently emerge from my shell some day here soon. Many thanks to everyone for their patience.

The (almost entirely true, barely embellished, practically sworn-testimony of the) Dog Story

(after having completed the story I can now add the qualifier: "way, way too long & detailed" Dog Story. Any of you who lived through this with me are welcome to skip. The rest of you darn well better read it and be glad you're not getting a verbal retelling which takes about an hour and a half.)

So it had been a rough week. My loving partner and my loving sister were both of the same mind: Get Ffemme a hot dogdog to ease her sadness. We went to the pound, searched pet finder high and low and eventually decided it is not the right time to get a dog. Why? Though I love my (small) house we don't have a yard, neither of us can come home every day at noon to let the dog out, Scully & I both travel a lot for work--we don't really have a life that will support a dog.

Instead I am off to Iowa. Joe cancels the appointments she made to see puppies. We plan a picnic at Branwen & Rhiannon's old school Roosevelt. It has a great playground for the kids, places for the old people (Jim & the like) to sit and is close to Joe's house if we forget something. It was quite nice and the whole clan turned out.

While we are eating our bologna sandwiches we see this old DOG walking towards us. And the dog is in bad shape. Its front legs are kind of bowed and it seems to have arthritis in its back hips so it hobbles, not unlike a young bear. She's a very sweet girl with a very pretty face although the rest of her seems mangy. Someone had shaved her but her hair had grown back in all matted. It took a while to figure out she was a Keeshond (thanks go to Kirsten.)

She is hungry and guess what? She likes bologna. Her tags say her name is Storm (terrible name for this dog) which she does not respond to. Maybe she's deaf? There's also a phone number. And what is a picnic without everyone bringing their cell phones? So Joe calls and the conversation goes like this:
Joe:Hi, we are at a park and we found your dog
Him: What? What dog?
Joe: Um, your dog
Him: What kind of dog? What does it look like?
Joe: It looks like a dog that had your phone number on it--exactly how many dogs are you missing??
Him: Well, we used to have some dogs in the frat but. . . I'm in Arizona.
Joe: Uh, great. Thanks.

This tells us all we need to know about him. Pissed off at people who abandon their dogs in general and at irresponsible college students in particular, we call the humane society. Though they are closed there is a cop who is willing to meet us out there and let the dog in.

Is this my dog? I ask. NO, replies everybody. I am unsure so I jump in the car with Kirsten and Joe who are taking the dog. The poor old dog has a hard time getting in the car but settles right down. She's very, very sweet. The cop that meets us out there is really nice and Kirsten remembers him being very good to battered women. This is a good sign. We know this dog won't be around long at the shelter, and not because she'll be adopted either. She looks like she has seen better days.

This nice cop cannot open any of the doors at the shelter. He tries all of his keys in all of the locks and though the keys will go in, they do not turn the lock. This has never happened to him before. "Is this a sign?" Joe asks him. "Sure," he replies. "He thinks this is a sign, Ffemme!"

At this point, the sweet old dog receives a name: Mi Osa "my bear". She is coming home with us.

We drive past the house that is listed on her tags. She sees her house and gets very excited. Joe goes up to the door and finds that the house is completely vacant. These people have left their good, old dog. Bastards.

At Joe's house the dog gets a bath. Though she clearly did not want one, she sighed and said "Oh, okay." I am massaging shampoo into the neck and chest of a dog that doesn't know me and she is so sweet & gentle that she just stands there. There are also two yappy neighbor dogs barking! barking! and this good old dog is absolutely silent.

After the bath she goes to the back door. "Isn't this where we go in?" she asks. So we let her in. She has a hard time with the stairs and it isn't long before she is actually carried up and down them. We soon discover the dog has perfect hearing. Not much time elapses in any Faisal household before you hear some Faisal crinkling open a package of something in the kitchen. And this dog hears it. She hears the small suction of a refrigerator door opening. She knows the squeak of the kitchen floor and can tell if you're in front of the dishwasher or in front of the stove.

She is also extremely smart. Unsure if she was fully housebroken, we lavished treats and rewards upon the dog when she successfully went outside to pee. She quickly learned the easiest way to a treat was to act like you need to go out, someone will CARRY you down the front stairs, you pee and get a treat! She had us trained immediately.

And Scully, poor unsuspecting Scully, gets a phone call. She is quiet on the other end of the phone. "So you're telling me that you're at a park and a hot dogdog just HAPPENS to walk up to you. . ." It did seem like a set up & Joe is known for occasional good-intentioned sneakiness. When she heard that it was not a hotdogdog and especially when she heard that, actually, I would NEVER have picked this dog she believed me. And I would never pick this dog. This dog picked me.

"Did she tell you, with her eyes, that she's your dog?" Scully asks. "Um, I'm not sure, but I think so!" replies the ever-decisive Ffemme. And then, "Okay, bring her down" a brief pause, " I will not be the only one responsible for this dog." That's how I knew Scully was serious. If she was being all la'a di daah I would have doubted her. But if she went immediately to the "accountability" discussion, she was for real.

Mi Osa did really, really well that night. She's an old girl so she mostly sleeps and lays around. She didn't have a single accident in Joe's house. Still, by morning I was vacillating again, because--see--I don't have a *life* that will support a dog. Kirsten could not take her. Joe can't breathe around dogs. It was Kansas or certain doom for this good old dog. And she deserved to have someone love her in her old age. She had to be at least 12.

Ultimately, I decided we should not take her, because I really can't have a dog.
And then, ultimately, ultimately, I brought her down to Kansas, because I just couldn't take her to a shelter.

She does so well in the car. Lets me know when she needs to stop, waits the 19 miles before I get to the next rest area. She's a good old dog. We get home and she immediately craps all over everything in the house. I don't think she could control it. We'd fed her bologna & god knows what she ate before she ran into us! So I don't blame her but I did call SKM to share my frustration. She gave me back a very empathetic, "Welcome to dog ownership" Thanks.

Scully says she has a sweet face but the rest of her looks awful. Really, the only thing that would have completed the look for Mi Osa was if she'd had one of those giant paper collars. One was sure to come soon, too, because she had some kind of growth or skin tag on her leg and she had licked it absolutely bare of hair. There was a storm and she worried about the thunder but everything was so new--of course she was a little needy. And then she would rub her body against our couch and I'd think, "do I want a dog??" It's all a little late for that question but remember, folks, I can't make up my mind about ANYTHING.

Its time for bed and there is no way this good old dog can get up our very steep wooden stairs. So we pen her in downstairs with a baby gate and we go up. She would have none of it. She knocked the baby gate over and got out. Then we hear the sound of a dog climbing stairs using only her front paws to drag the rest of body up to be with us. With a small amount of pressure Scully agrees that Mi Osa can sleep in our room on the floor. Neither of us want her in our bed. This, however, just does not work.

She lays down and we hear the constant licking, licking, licking. She won't settle down and I have decided that I should not have a dog. I'm taking her to the shelter tomorrow, we don't have to worry about establishing any kinds of patterns, I will sleep downstairs on the couch so the dog can sleep downstairs. I carry her down the stairs and we have a good night overall but are still destined for the animal shelter Monday.

The shelter doesn't open until 10. I look at Osa (now just simply called "Osa" because it seems terrible to use the possessive "Mi" in her name when I'm so ready to abandon her at a shelter) and she looks at me. So this is the message I leave for Scully at work. "If you have time and patience for me, please call me back to talk more about the dog. But if you don't have both of those things, please don't call. So, time and patience, call. Otherwise, don't worry about it." Good woman. She calls me back right away.

And I am crying. Is this a test? Is the universe testing me? I don't want to take this dog to shelter. She already looks at me like I'm her designated human. She's already been abandoned once. I feel like I'm supposed to have this dog. But I don't want a dog. I don't want my house to smell like dog. This dog has massive amounts of hair & shedding. My neck is hot and itchy. I'm having some sort of reaction to the dog or to something that she's been in. Am I supposed to prove that I'm compassionate and capable of love and responsible? Once again, I am very worried about making the wrong decision. The problem with taking her to a shelter was that if it turned out to be the wrong decision it would be very, very wrong. The problem with keeping her is that I don't seem to ever feel like I've actually made the decision. And I don't want a dog. And I am still crying.

Take her to the vet, says my girl who has both time and patience. That will tell us more about what we are signing up for.

I make a vet appointment for later in the day. They don't usually take walk ins on Monday because they have surgeries but it just so happens that there are no surgeries scheduled today.

And that's sort of the basic story of this dog. "It just so happens. . ."

Back in Iowa Jim calls Vet Med in Ames because Mi Osa (possessive returned) has a vaccination tag from there. So he calls to get some medical records and discovers. . .

Mi Osa has an owner. And she's looking for her dog. And she's not sure how her dog got to Kansas.

UnFngBeliveable.

She had recently moved. Her 10 year old daughter has been worrying about their dog for days. The dog "Storm" figured out how to open the screen door at her mother's house and got out. She (allegedly a "he") headed back for the old neighborhood and happened upon a bunch of overprotective dog-lovers who decided the dog should come to Kansas.

The bad news is: that very morning, the day after I just returned from Iowa, I got back on I-35 and headed north. The good news is she met me in MO so I was back in my house by 4 o'clock instead of 8. Additional good news, this was all discovered in time to cancel the vet appointment which would surely have cost quite a bit.

UnFngBelievable.

And yet, perhaps this was all choreographed by the universe.

I learned that I did NOT want a dog and no one got hurt. That's amazing. I could have easily spent hundreds of dollars and broken the heart of some hot dogdog trying to discover that self-truth.

The other life lesson was that when your dad says "Ffemme, this dog is not your problem. This dog is someone else's problem" sometimes he's right. Sometimes.

And the final lesson is: if you move or break up with some jerk who moves to AZ, get a new damn dog ID tag. They cost $2!

Okay, thanks for working through all of that with me. Much love to anyone who is still reading at this point and (of course) love to those of you who stopped reading already as well.

:* (kisses)

race wars are always an internal battle

I'm sliding between random fluffiness and serious thought. I flee from serious thought when I should not or worse I try to mix the two. (Example to follow)

I first heard about this via News & Notes and then checked it out in Indian Country Today. The Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma has voted to expel a group known as the "Freedmen." Prior to the Civil War the Cherokee owned African slaves. The slaves became citizens of the Cherokee Nation after the war and have held citizenship although they did not have any Cherokee ancestry. (although surely it's not that simple. The lists that were created separated people on with the idea of either/or = either indian or black) The expulsion is being described as an ethnic cleansing of the Cherokee Nation. As you can imagine all the ironies begin to landslide:

"That's why the case has drawn the ire of the entire Congressional Black Caucus, which, in recognition of the shared suffering of Native and African Americans, has been a consistent champion of Indian causes. When Cherokee voters decided to strip the Freedmen of their full membership they were essentially legitimizing the one-drop rule. At the turn of the 19th century, the U.S. government relied on that racist tool, originally used to determine whether people were black or not, in combination with other factors for a census of people living on Native American tribal lands. Those who seemed Cherokee, or Cherokee mixed with white, were placed on a "Cherokee-by-blood" list. Those who seemed black, or Cherokee mixed with black, were generally placed on a "Freedmen" list. Both lists, known as the Dawes Rolls, were used to divest the collective tribe of its land holdings and apportion acreage to individual members — to make way for white settlers to move in and buy up the individual holdings. But spouses of Freedmen did not receive land allotments, while spouses of Cherokee-by-blood did, and land given to Freedmen was made available for sale sooner than Indian land. " from a surprisingly interesting article in time.

As stated above: the landsliding ironies

• the house of representatives is threatening to cut off all federal funds to the tribe because it is violating it's treaty with the us by excluding the freedmen. wow. apparently treaties with indian tribes are important. who knew?
• there's plenty of interest in reparations for descendants of slaves--as long as the reparations aren't coming from the us government.
• the lists being relied upon were created to consolidate white power by damaging the concept of collectivity and community and the lists are, apparently, still quite effective
• Cherokee Freedmen are, again, having to fight for recognition as citizens
• and once again, identity is being legislated into a callous meaninglessness

The most brilliant quote from the above article:

"I refuse to create a sieve through which our grandchildren will fall out," says David Cornsilk, a Cherokee-by-blood who sides with the Freedmen.

It makes me think of this quote by Cherie Moraga (also brilliant) from the Incite conference I went to with Lopie in Chicago

"How do I teach my child the truth about genocide and still teach him to love past the front door?" She talked about feeling her own world get smaller and smaller, her social circles getting more and more narrow. And then she rejected that isolation. The cost of engaging with the larger world, though, is constantly being hit in the face by shit that should have been figured out already (sexism, homophobia, racism and on & on & on)

Who will my daughter be?

Will any of these questions even matter to her?

Will she feel saudi? arab? like a member of my tribe?

I take for granted that she will feel Mexican/Latina/Chicana (especially since I love to call her mi chiquita chicana)

How does this work anyway? Will she tell me that she feels like a mixed blood brown girl? How will our next child (inshallah) change Khubz's raced identity? Will one be la morenita and the other the light one? Will Khubz (or anyone else who comes to us) love the brown girl josie poem? especially when i say, "i am okay being brown, brown girl khubz. all the time brown girl khubz is okay"

Didn't I say I'd be mixing this with frivolity? What's going on around here?

How about this: If I didn't have a fruitblog I would have either a blog anchored by orchids

or bizzaro underwater sea creatures.

Fruitfemme by the Numbers

It looks like Dory will live.

I saw it was our mechanic on the caller id & I answered it by asking for the bad news. Not all bad, it seems. An alternator. Uh, okay. $300. Great! I said. And I'm thrilled we don't need to buy a new car because some other numbers are hanging out there.

• $2000.oo to my dentist because sedation, while glorious, is costly. There's more good news to come, too, as I have to go see an endodontist because a root canal I had four years ago wasn't painful enough.
• $500.oo to expedite our passports after the titillating conversation with the clerks about ownership over khubz
• $300.oo in an adjustment for our escrow on our house
• $600.oo for our AC because the cheaper $100 fix poisons the earth (even more) that Khubz will have to live with.

It's been a pricey month.

Since my last top 10 list was met with some dissatisfaction, let me try again:

1. I am currently fighting off Panic At the Disco whose song Build God Then We'll Talk is running endlessly through my head
2. I had to google "whose" to make sure I was using the correct spelling.
3. I am feeling dissatisfied about the ending to the Forsyte Saga. It was horrible. And I take no comfort in all of the change, in the passionate love that was lived and I kept thinking, what would I write about this? What symbol? Family? Money? Touch, maybe. Unfortunately, there's redemption for Soames in the end. Even as I write this I know my mother would not want me to wish for such simplicity as a thoroughly evil Soames. But I do. I hated the ending. And what about June? I sort of thought she was a much more interesting character than Irene. I could vomit on Jon for leaving his mother right after his father died and his foolishness with Fluer whose name I hate. And what about Young Jolyn naming his second son Jolyn right after learning that his other son Jolly/Jolyn had died in more foolishness? And what was the Boer war anyway??
4. I have slept most of the day, getting the sedation out of my system with copious amounts of water and plenty of icecream.
5. I did try to reread 1984 but it was so dark and I'm having a hard time warding off sadness, lately, strange as that sounds from someone whose (used correctly, thank you) gratitude is endless for having Khubz
6. (reflecting on #5) I have a hard time expressing any emotion other than happiness for fear that the universe will think I am ungrateful. I am not ungrateful. I love my daughter and my partner. I am happy every day to wake up with them. I am still sometimes very sad and sometimes quite lonely. I am grateful, though, very, very grateful.
7. I like this blog better when it is frivolous so you'll all have to be satisfied with a list of 7.