Shut the fuck up

I really am a dyke.

These posts are not full of girl-on-girl action, of heaving y licking y the occasional fist. Frankly, I wish there was more fruit here at the basket but I am a dyke who also needs to pay bills, pack tomorrow's lunch, argue with my partner y push the laundry off the bed so I can collapse.

And I really am an Arab.

I am pretty useless in my americanized, non-Arabic speaking way. I am not brown enough to be a collectible but my light skin y perfect English make me oh-so-approachable. My ethnic inheritance includes a load of anger, a suspicious name, fearful reverence of the evil-eye and poly cystic ovarian syndrome (the leading cause of infertility among Saudi women).

I never read the gaygirldamascus blog or the lezbireal site. My life is too messy to fulfill all the imaginings of racist boys bored with their own heterosexuality. They will surely continue jerking off to eachother while howling loudly about " not being taken seriously."

I will not compete with idiots y assholes about the glamor potential of my mis/representations.

I am busy carving out my actual existence.

No worries, right?

By the way, that "hold it together, man!" was said in my best Captain Kirk immitation. I realize this morning that you can't actually *hear* the tone so I thought I'd reassure that all is okay & that last bit was actually meant to be *funny.*

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

amost live blogging

Well, i'm here in KY, Louisville specifically. Lovely city. We've had amazing food. Very kind people. 16th largest us city, did you know? So my problems are not about louisville or ky even. It's just that

i'm away from my family for a week. Blech.

Khubz has an ear infection, again. We are taking her to an ENT doc next to talk about tubes. This is her seventh ear infection since last september.

it's primary night in ky and where is hillary holding her primary night gala?
at. this. hotel.
for. real.

We've all been issued wrist bands to prove we're in the country (hotel) legally. Secret service are crawling all over this place, which frankly is fucking creepy enough all ready because the fucking NRA is having some sort of meeting here today. THE HOTEL IS GOING ON LOCKDOWN THIS EVENING.

I feel like in some ways this may be a missed opportunity for live event blogging but I don't think I'd be able to stomach it.

Instead let me widge on about my pregnancy. I'm feeling much better, not nearly as naseuas this week. We found a great bistro a couple blocks from the hotel and I had an amazing salad of spinach, walnuts, strawberries and goat cheese crutons. YUM. I also had some salmon. I get to check off 3 major food groups: leafy greens, protein, & omega-3 fats. Great.

I cannot wait to talk to a nutritionalist about what I should/not be eating during this pregnancy. Mostly because I want to actively avoid gestational diabetes and I would like these babies to come safely into the world and I would like to stay safely in the world. I have obligations already, you know?

Alright, I'm signing off. Thanks for listeneing.

Happy Birthday Basket!

Yeehaw! My Blog turns one today!

Has it been a year? And I've kept up with it? Yea me!

Because it is my blog's birthday and it is also "women should brag about themselves more" day here is a hit list of posts I read whenever I am reassuring myself that I should keep writing. Feel free to browse. Would you like to revisit the. . .

• Simple delights of the horned melon?
• The first time Scully blushed & asked me not to share quite so much?
• The time before Khubz decided that bananas were the source of all goodness in the world?
• My realization that I want Khubz to eat like an arab?
• pomelo to end all pomelos?
• moment I came out not only as a queer with a fruit fetish but as a brazen liar as well?
• folliculitis. say it with me folliculitis.
• all my ethnic guilt laid out for all to see at the spanish story hour?
• leche lost & found?

I love blogging & am thrilled by the things I've read, written, heard & learned in the last year. Thanks for reading!

So happy birthday, Fruit Basket!

here's a present to my blog:

Blogging for Choice: Choosing my body

Bodies on the margins have always had to fight for integrity.

Untidy, abnormal, non-compliant, oppositional bodies.

Bodies that can't be ignored when they're too big or small or too female or too ambiguous or too uncaring of gender rules altogether or too mobile in a power chair or too loud with their sign language or too brown or too black or too difficult to categorize or too fertile/infertile or too damn many of the above all at once.

Choice is the insistence on my body

My queer
fat
woman
body
My quasi-colored body

I use my body
in the service of these
illegal border crossings

I spill over
the sides of my seat
on a plane

I am a
passing
threat
toowhiteortoobrown
for you

I lay as a woman
with a woman
unscripted
in a world
that denies us

My choice
My daily choice
Is not solely about
abortion

It is that
this body
is
my body
even as it is

just as it is

without
anybody's
permission

Let's not read too much in to this

There's a 56% Chance That You Need Therapy

If you think you need therapy, you probably do. But there's a good chance you don't. Like everyone else, you have your fair share of problems. And unlike most people, you're fairly good at solving them yourself.

Do You Need Therapy?

Missing Widgets

Can you see my sidebar? With my links? My moon-watcher? My daughter's foot?? Where have my widgets gone?

Housekeeping

I know we have all already agreed that google sucks balls and that all the cool kids have left blogger for wordpress and that a friend even offered to host me so i, too, could leave blogger and that despite it all i have decided to stay. with that preamble, i have a complaint.

Blogger has stopped emailing me when a comment is left on my blog. I have reset my comment notification and still nothing. When i leave a comment on my own blog, i get a notification. otherwise, zip.

Additionally, someone has been leaving comments about 50 paragraphs long about wwii conspiracy theories randomly on different posts. WTF?

In an effort to be a responsible blog/er, I am bowing down to comment moderation in the hopes they will actually send me an email to notify me and so i can screen out the wwii fetishists.

Please consider this an apology as i feel like its a bit obnoxious.

Just hang in there with me, eh?

Thanks!

Dia De Guadalupe

Happy Dia De Guadalupe!

Whether you get down with a traditional Guadalupe

or a more modern manifestation

Or if, in fact, you rest easy with her in roses

We should all take a minute to thank this Goddess of the Americas.
She brought roses in winter
She preserved the Goddess in the face of a colonizing religion
She has brought me, personally, indescribable gifts. For that I thank her.


In other news, I have some others to thank as well.

With many thanks for the "gentle encouragement" from AMack, CutiePants and Rivolta, I should apologize for my inexplicable hiatus. Things are bonkers at work right now and frankly, things are so enjoyable at home that I don't want to retreat into the basement to blog. At the same time there's quite a bit going on in the world and in my world. Most of the time I have either an excited sense of "Oh, I am SO blogging this!" or a heavy sense of "Goddamnit, I'm going to have to blog this, aren't I??"

So I have a list of things spinning in my head but I'm not being particularly witty because I don't have much time right now. Let me quote a dear friend and superior blogger: "It's just that sometimes, I find myself giving in to the dominant linguistic and cultural paradigm, because I just don't have the creative power necessary to generate my own description of events without falling back on cliches." So rather than following her lead of being ridiculously intellectually lazy
I'll pacify everyone with a quick Khubz story. I'll get to the political ranting & ravings of Islam and violence against women, of receiving federally funded technical assistance about my lack of parenting skills, of the pure and utter freedom we have all felt since Scully finished her last final. . . But until I garner the creative power necessary just settle in with this: Khubz has learned to count to three.

Khubz divides the world into three categories.

1. That which is of the mommies. This includes the mommies themselves and anything they keep on or near their person. Cell phones, their hair, any food they might be eating. Anything which falls into this category is of goodness and should be shared one and all.

2. That which is of nonono. This includes a wide range of things, many of which dangle invitingly on a tree newly erected in the living room. Tinsle, electrical outlets, remote controls--you get the idea. Anything which falls into this category should be secretly coveted until the moment is right.

3. That which is of bananas. This really just includes bananas but all of bananas: The banana itself, the banana peel, the mere suggestion that there might be more bananas. Anything which falls into this category must be devoured immediately and stuffed into one's mouth while demanding more.

I can't wait to see what happens when she learns to count to 10. Stay tuned.

Getting worse

And somehow, things got worse just by posting their stupid rating.

<>

I get an "F" for Accessibility

I suck!

Sorry. I'll try to do better. . .

A Post for the Posterior's Posterity

This is less a blog post and more a plea. Please post a comment encouraging Scully to make the only decent choice. Ask her to just let me take the damn picture.

Scully, it seems, is a bit shy. I should say first that it is her birthday--happy birthday, habibeti! And secondly, for anyone who worries about me on such occasions--i did remember & greet & treat her properly.

But so she's doing this whole "shy" thing. Now if you know Scully then you know that she is not shy. We can't run to the grocery store without me feeling like a politician's wife. We have to say hi to everyone and if we don't know them that's even more reason to strike up a conversation. She's like my dad that way. That's fine. It's just not who I am.

Back to her newfound shyness. So "you're not shy! why are you pretending?!" I ask her, exasperated. "What is you're deal with this oh, i'm too shy bit?!"

"You want to put a picture of my ass on the internet!" she responds.

"I wouldn't show your face" I reassure her, not so successfully.

"My ASS. You want to put up a picture of my ASS."

"That's stretching it a bit, yeah? Really, I just want to put up a picture of your bruise."

"The bruise that extends all over my entire left butt cheek. That counts as my ASS. No. No. Fruitfemme? NO."

(And before anyone goes & gets any ideas. I said I had a fruit fetish. Nothing else. okay? So put those nasty ideas away. I mean, come on. I don't even like my fruit bruised.)

Poor woman. She won't let me put up a picture of the bruise but it's bad. It is easily as big as my entire hand, fingers spread out. It is black with purple streaks. What happened?

Yes.

She fell down the entire length of the stairs. Hamdillah, Khubz was not with her. Hamdillah, she is alright and the only injury she sustained was a fairly massive bruise to her left butt cheek. And since she's going to be okay, and since we'll eventually repair the railling, and since we have already swept up the broken screws and chunks of drywall. . . don't we need a picture to remember the whole story best?!

Please, talk some sense into her. I can't.

p.s. Where was Khubz during this dramatic incident?

Reading my newly borrowed copy of Foreskin's Lament. Nice. Nice.

A bit better

Well, I've been learning from some challenging people today. One woman in particular cannot say anything without me feeling like she has just vomited on me, shit on me and then set me on fire. It's not her fault, right? She clearly has some communication problems.

But things seem to be a bit better. We had dinner with a woman (employed by the above woman) who does not shit on us, vomit on us or set us on fire. She sometimes says things like, "oh, vomit? I didn't even notice the vomit. You know, I don't think that's vomit at all, do you?" but tonight she said some things like, "yeah, i think I've sometimes smelled something like vomit. I've never seen it, of course, but I accept your perspective that the acidic, partially digested bile all over you is, in fact, vomit."

BTW, Rivolta has won her challenge. It is impossible for me to go 15 posts without using my "graphic descriptions of bodily fluids basket" label. She said I failed some 10 posts ago when I was writing about flatulence. Who knew she was such a weenie? So here is my official concession: "Sally, you were right. I was wrong. My name is the FruitFemme. And I have a problem with inappropriate communication about bodily functions."

So back to the inappropriate shit/vomit/fire story. I do consider it progress that she at least acknowledged the smell of the vomit that we had been subjected to over the course of this meeting.

One more fucking day. One more.

On a lighter note, I had my first phone call with my daughter today! Scully put me on speaker phone and Khubz said "Hiya uma!" It was so clear that I thought Scully was imitating Khubz, just to get her to speak up. But it was Khubz! And she said it twice!!

I was thrilled. So I recited Dig, Ivan, Dig and then Little Quack and told her I loved her. And then she began to wail and sob. At first I thought, "oh, she misses me! I'm coming soon, habibeti!" but then Scully let me know that she's really okay and was pissed because there's no more avocado. Ah. Ahem. That's okay. I wasn't sweating it anyway.

So how is the weaning going? Well, there are hot rocks in my sports bra that I have fastened as tightly as possible around my ever hardening bosom. I have always had a thing for butches that bind their breasts but I have a newfound appreciation for how uncomfortable it must be. Other than that, I feel moderately sad. But the poem helped and all the lovely supportive comments really, really helped.

Actually, this whole blog/community thing has really, really helped. And I do feel a bit better.

Thanks.

That's it

Forget it. Instead, enjoy this picture.

Well hell I don't know

What's going on around here? Does it suck? I can't tell anymore.

Keep your hardhat on.

Caution! Construction Zone

I don't want to hear it.

I am a bit bored with the dark dots and there is no reason to feel stodgy when shaking it up only requires patience and a bit of html code.

So hang in there with me. It'll get better. And worse. But hopefully better again.

Really, A Mack, if you're worried, just blame it on "Those Who Know Best" and bring me some more gum.

The Big Eight

You can all blame Veronica for my participation in this meme. Enjoy!

8 Things I am Passionate About

• My family: Scully, Khubz, my Iowa family, my Texas family, Missouri & Colorado family and family in a few more places besides

• Anti-racist parenting: Seeing all these ISMs play out in Khubz's world makes me think about people who challenge power all the while knowing that their children will be punnished for their transgressions at the same time knowing that their children's lives and possible lives depend on such transgressions.



• Being conscious of how we spend our money: Money is your values laid out in numbers, right? And sometimes this speaks well of the decisions we make and sometimes this speaks to the difficult options/practical realities we all face (are we back to talking about daycare again??)



• Encouraging broad & fluid ideas of gender: Yesterday Khubz went to daycare in overalls with a button down flannel shirt. "It's dress like a dyke day at daycare!" I proclaimed. "Wouldn't that be everyday?" Scully counters. Some folks misunderstand butch/femme as rigid roles but that's not what the dynamic is between me & Scully at all. Even though some things fall down that way (I do most of the cooking, she does most of the home-repair) lots of other things don't fit in those boxes at all (she does all of the cleaning/laundry and I forget important anniversaries.) I hope she learns there are a million way to be a woman or a man or both or something entirely different.



• Ending violence against women: This doesn't show up so much in my posts but it is definitely more than my day job. You'll just have to trust me on this one.



• Sharing food to build community: This has looked a lot different since Khubz has come along. In my pre-Khubz days I was known for doing "drive by fruitings" or spontaneous deliveries of fruit to friends' homes. Now it's much easier to have people come by but I try to always have something to share.

8 Things I Want To Do Before I Die

• Have more kids. Four would be nice but I'm not sure my fairly infertile body will support this goal. Stay tuned.



• Stay at home with Khubz and anyone else who comes to us and my sisters kids (all of this would be happening in Iowa, to complete the fantasy.)



• Learn Spanish. This better happen long, long before the "when I die" stage.



• Take Scully and the kid/s to some Araby country. I used to want to go to Algeria but I think Kuwait might be as close as I could get to showing them what I remember.



• Learn to make my own cheese. And yogurt. And pasta.



• Own property in the country that operates as a retreat site. It would be fully accessible (like wheelchair access on the playground, menus for people with diabetes or celliac diseas or low carbers, multilingual signage, all of that!) It would be affordable for everyone (low cost access for women raising kids & living in poverty or for non-profits--at least the ones that aren't shitty & oppressive.) And it would be sustainable for us & the world (local, organic and homegrown food; recycled building materials, slow growth to make the project low debt.) Tall order, but this is a wishlist (sort of) right??



• Write more poetry that make good performance pieces

Things I say often

• "Abre tu boca!" Usually when Khubz seizes upon a cheerio or pinto bean of unknown age or even better when she finds an all together unknown thing and stuffs it in her mouth.



• Inshallah, Hamdillah & Mashallah. 'Nuff said.



• "I love you." This has multiple meanings. Joyous: I love you! Thrilled: I LOVE YOU! Wrapping up a phone call: Okay, I love you.



• FUCK. Way, waaay too many meanings to detail in this humble post.
  
• "Donde esta tu lengua?" Khubz generally does a quick assessment to see how badly I want to impress the person before us. Anytime I seem too anxious to show her off she keeps her tongue firmly hidden behind her mouth, coyly kept closed.
  
• "Before you sit down. . . " or "While you're up will you. . ."



• "What is their fucking problem??" quickly followed by "Who the fuck do they think they are??"



• "Next time, I'm going to. . ." I don't need to elaborate on that one, do I?

8 Books I Have Read Recently

• The Memory Keeper's Daughter
• Little Quack
• The Hard Man by Penny Jordan (yes, yes, I am ashamed)
• Baby Palabras
• Conquest: Sexual Violence & American Indian Genocide
• The World of the Forsythes
• Good Woman: Poems by Lucille Clifton
• Tightwad Gazette

8 Songs I Could Listen To Over & Over

• Swan Dive by Ani Difranco
• Henna by Cameron Cartio
• Would You Harbor Me? by Sweet Honey in the Rock
• 18 Wheels by Trout Fishing in America
• Jig of Life by Kate Bush
• Almost any Dresden Doll song (thanks alot Rivolta)
• Prospero's Speech by Lorena McKennit
• Remember the Tinman by Tracy Chapman

8 Things that Attract me to Good Friends

• Kindness & a willingness to give me grace for all my imperfections/failures/bad days


• A world view that the world works and looks differently for different people


• Recognition that motherwork is real work (undervalued, joyous & crappy, life-changing, world-changing political work.)


• Willingness to challenge yourself & me & others around the ISMs we have all been bombarded with all our lives


• Love or at least respect for feminism while at the same time critiqing the white, middle-class lens that too much feminist theory suffers from.


• Curiosity, sarcasm & wit (in equal parts)


• Adoration of Khubz, of course!


• Authenticity, not in representing your designated group identity, but in actually being who you actually are.

8 Ways to Shake Up a Meme

• Take out the tagging of 8 other people--my track record on my last tags is not so good, you know what I mean?

• 8 Poets Everyone Should Check Out: Lucille Clifton, Audre Lorde, Pat Parker, Cherie Moraga, Kate Rushin, Mango Tribe, Essex Hemphill and me!

• 8 Things I Love About Blogging: It's gotten me writing again. I've met awesome people I never would have otherwise met. There are people I have met that I've gotten to know better and grown closer to through their blogs. I'd never actually keep up with a scrapbook on what Khubz is up to. It's given me something else to feel proud of. It is a public outlet for my fruit fetish. I don't have to feel guilty about not emailing out regular updates to family!

• 8 Fun Words that Feel Lovely in One's Mouth: Ankh. Pumpkin. Zipper. Pantriculation. Sigh. Knead. Starfruit. Flame.

• 8 Essential Items In Case of Emergency: Cell phone. Cheerios. Diaper. Wipes. Gel pen. Change for the soda machine. Keys. Kleenex.

• 8 Numbers that come before the number 8: 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

• 8 Ways to screw with people who demand meme compliance: end your list of 8 things with a list of 7.

the poop scoop

Ah. . . I have been issued a challenge (several, actually)

First: Scully is taking in the cosmopolitan sights known as Little Rock, Arkansas and so Khubz & I are hanging out by our lonesome. Except, I've guilt-tripped all of our friends in to coming over this week and babysitting me. For real. Every night Scully is gone. Awesome friends. But the challenge--the challenge was Khubz drop-off at daycare. I have never dropped her off at this daycare and we all remember the challenges Scully faced in getting Khubz through the transition. So I was expecting something pretty bad as having me drop her off is a significant change in the routine. It was. . . okay. There was crying and a bit of clawing at my leg but no shrieking and I didn't even look back to see her banging on the door. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.

Second: I have been tagged with a fun but extensive meme . This challenge doesn't involve as much crying as the first challenge but it does involve some time. So please bear with me as I consider this MISSION STILL IN DRAFT FORM.

And finally: I have been asked to prove my competence as an intelligent adult capable of blogging for 15 straight posts without using the "Graphic Descriptions of Bodily Fluids Basket" tag. Rivolta, I accept your challenge! To get it all out of my system, however, I thought I'd showcase some of the valuable, hilarious and downright intelligent kinds of posts we'll be missing out on here at the fruit basket (for 15 posts anyway.) My plea to all gentle readers is: SEND ME YOUR POOP! (not literally, please) and check out all the blogosphere has to offer relating to young children and the waste matter they excrete. Feel free to drop your links in the comment section. Rivolta, just for you, this MISSION IS IN PROGRESS. I'll do a poop round-up before undertaking my fast from "bodily fluids basket" posts. Stay tuned!

DeLurk!

Do you already know about this?



Thanks, as always, to Two Shews for keeping me up on the blogosphere.

Today is official "DeLurker" day. I'm awfully glad you're here and I hope you leave a comment in honor of DeLurker Day.

(A Lurker is someone who reads the blog but never comments, leaving the author to feel like nobody ever, ever reads the blog. This only leads to oversharing in an attempt to cajole the silent masses into talking back. And trust me, you don't want to know about _______ )

So make my day! Leave a comment.

You can start by completing the following sentence:
No, trust me, I really, really DO want to know about ______ .

p.s. Don't be fearful--I've already rudely called out one person on the blog. I promise never to do so again. No matter how much that Sally girl threatens me. :)