I'll be reading Growing Up with Tamales for story time at Blue Willow Bookshop, in Houston, on Thursday morning, May 15. Tell everyone you know with kids in the Houston area. How do you find and support local indie book stores like Blue Willow? By going to Booksense.
On Saturday, May 17, I'll be in Dallas, reading and signing at the J. Erik Jonsson Central Library, for the 13th Dallas Children’s Book Fair & Literary Festival.
On June 22, here in Houston, I'm going to do a poetry workshop. It's free and open to the public, y'all, and they're having one every Sunday in June, taught by local poets I love and respect. So come on down.
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
what happens mostAll day long I look at people doing things they don't want to do, or not doing things they do want to do. It's depressing.
Obviously, most of us have to work for our living. But does that also mean that we have to talk about the weather? Eat bland food? Buy only one bag, and make sure that bag is black so that it goes with everything? Watch whatever they put on the TV at 7 PM? Stay home when we'd really rather be out, doing anything else? Drive by places we'd like to see, but tell ourselves we can't go in, for no reason at all? Wear whatever set of something that someone put on a rack? Keep our opinions to ourselves? Keep our eyes down? Laugh at things that aren't funny? Smile at people we don't like? Do things for people who don't appreciate it, and wait in vain for them to do things for us? Do the same things every day, even if they've never made us happy?
Why, people? Come on and love yourselves better. If you don't, who will?
A Sad Story About Body Image
A while back I hauled my boyfriend, Tad, to the 35th anniversary celebration of MECA, the local non-profit arts organization at which I used to do artsy stuff as a teenager. Someone there had made a DVD compilation of many shows they've hosted over the years. One of them was West Side Story, staged in 1989, in which seventeen-year-old me played Anita.
My boyfriend Tad wanted to see the whole thing, so we borrowed MECA's old VHS tape of the first half. (It's like, three thousand hours long, and no one knows where the VHS of the second half is.) I told the MECAns that I would have it copied to DVD and then return it postehaste.
At home, Tad and I made popcorn (or glasses of wine, can't remember) and settled in to watch the blast from my past. We pushed Play on the VCR (that I still keep plugged in because it's the only way we have of connecting the DVD, the PS2, and the XBOX360 to our TV. I know -- I need to upgrade.)
Just hearing the intro music made me nervous. Then, I saw myself on stage in my red satin dress with salsa petticoats, in the long, brown, curly-haired wig that covered my tacky '90s skater hair, in the flat jazz shoes I had to wear instead of the sexy character shoes that everyone else wore, so that I wouldn't be taller than Bernardo... and the first thing I thought was, "God, I'm so big."
I was 5'9", size 6.
God, I was so big.
I'm not saying that as a former or current sufferer of body dysmorphia. I'm just telling y'all that, compared to everyone else I knew then, I was very big.
Watching the show made me uncomfortable. I don't think I'd ever even seen it before in its entirety, but watching myself on the TV that night instantly freaking transported me into the prism of awkwardness that I was way back then. I saw my lackluster dancing and it made me feel, again, the fear of putting my arms out too far, standing up too straight, and being too big for the stage, my man, and everyone else. I heard my minimalist line recital and felt again the fear of being too Latina or not Latina enough. Too good or not good enough. I looked at my own face and re-felt all the worries, fears, insecurities, and awkward, awkward, embarrassing, humiliating, shame and guilt and insecure, fearful, worried etcetera. All the time. Every day.
"This is terrible," I said.
"This is awesome," Tad said. "You were hot. I wish I'd known you back then. I mean, even though I was only eleven years old and you wouldn't have talked to me. But still."
"I'm so big," I said. And then I told Tad everything I just told you, about the insecurity and the awkwardness and the bleh.
He said I wasn't big at all. He said, "Baby. You were a woman, and those other girls were girls. That's nothing to be ashamed of."
Why didn't he tell me that back then? you're wondering. I don't know.
Anyway. I called my friend Letty, also a MECA survivor, and she told me she often felt the same way. Too big. Not small enough. Weird. Ungainly. Grotesque. Like a monster. Funny how the world can make you feel that way, while simultaneously exploiting girls your age for illegal pornography. You know?
So anyhow. I decided not to have the VHS tape made into a DVD. I don't want that thing. It doesn't make me happy.
I was kind of sad not to see the second half, though. The second half contained my best song -- a duet with my friend Tania, who got the Maria part but wanted Anita, while I got Anita and wanted Maria so badly. I think we did very well, considering that she was the natural alto and I was the second soprano.
Also, the second half contained the "struggle" scene, which was pretty much an attempted rape scene, in which Ziggy Garcia played a white guy Jet who wanted a taste of spicy Anita, and in which I regularly fought Ziggy off, sometimes to the point of hurting him, and once to the point of my wig falling off. That was a fun scene to play. It was cathartic, at least -- all that angst getting channeled into violence. Getting to be angry in front of everybody. Being glad, for the moment, that I was big.
A Sad Message for Twenty-Something Women
I'm going to tell y'all something that a thirty-something woman told me, back when I was in my twenties. Because it was something I never would have known, otherwise, and because I love y'all. Here it is:
The first part of you to get old is your stomach.
Your digestive system, to be exact. That's the first thing on your body to fall apart. When you turn thirty, something on that trail will start slacking on the job. Acid reflux. Constipation. Gall stones. Flatulence. Etcetera.
You'll think back to all the times you heard older people make weird, random-seeming complaints like, "I need more fiber" or "I wish I could eat processed meats" or "Today's one of those mashed-potatoes-only days for me." And you'll be like, "ZOMG! Now I know what they're talking about! And therefore, I am turning old!"
And you'll be right. And you'll be sad.
I'm just telling y'all because I love y'all, and I don't want you to be scared when you turn thirty, thinking that it's only happening to you. It's not. It's happening to us all, and we will all end up eating nothing but mashed potatoes and oatmeal. It's the cycle of life.
Toby Update
1. Starbuck still doesn't like Toby.
2. Toby still feels a need to dig in the houseplant, although I couldn't tell if it was for waste products or just for fun.
3. Toby discovered that food and water taste even better when they come from Starbuck's bowls.
4. Starbuck kind of hates Toby's guts, actually.
5. I forgot to tell y'all the other day that I think Toby's part Siamese, or some other kind of Asian cat ethnicity. You can't really tell in the pics I've shown you, but he has the Asian cat eyes and head shape. When we got him, he didn't really meow a lot. When he got home, I noted that he would meow once, in response to his name. (Smart boy.) But then, last night, at 1 AM, Toby decided he needed to meow. A lot. It was like, "Meow. What's up, y'all? How come everyone's lying down and all the lights are off? What's everybody doing? Why isn't anyone petting me? Hello? HELLO-O-O-O!"
And I was like, "Oh my god, someone's on fire!" as I jumped out of bed and ran into the kitchen to warm a bottle or catch vomit in my hands or fight off a monster or whatever. But it was just Toby, speaking his mind. He got quiet as soon as I came out and found him. He even stayed quiet when I tripped over his giant cat body in the dark. So I pet him half a time, told him to play quietly, and went back to bed.
Thirty minutes later, it started again. "Hello! You guys! What's up? I thought y'all woke up and were gonna play with me! How come I'm the only one talking? Meow!"
I ignored him so he wouldn't be rewarded for his noise-making. He quieted down. Then, an hour later, he piped up again. But this time it was more like, "Meow yow yow, doo dee doo... Here I am, walking around. I think I'll eat from this bowl. Mm, that was good. Hmm. Why's that other cat hissing at me again? Man, it sure is quiet in here. Hey, what's that out the window? Man, I sure am awake now. Funny how I'm the only one..."
And then I thought that he sounded Siamese. Because isn't that something Siamese cats do? Talk to themselves?
6. I took more pictures of Toby and Starbuck, with a Mexican piggy bank next to each for scale. Didn't have time to post them, though. I'll have to do that later today, after the day job is done.
Shimmy Update
I'm still doing the Shimmies. However, I'm starting to realize that belly dancing in sweatpants and a t-shirt could never be as fun as belly dancing in a hip scarf and sequined bra.
That's how they get you, see. That's how they get you hooked. They make you shake your hips to the too-mellow music, and then you wish you had fake gold coins to keep the beat. Next thing you know, you're spending all your money on costumes and spending all your weekends at the Renaissance fairs.
It's a racket, I tell you. "Sensual dance with mystical origins, as old as the sands of time." Sure. That's how old the hip-scarf-selling racket is. I should have known. 5:21 AM #
Comments:
Holy crap. There I was innocently reading your entry when I got to the part where you revealed you were 5'9" and size SIX! You made me gasp out loud at work. You are gorgeous now, then, forever.-Moira
# posted by
: 1:58 PM
Bwah. I've never had a Siamese, though I too hear they are chatty. But then again, so is my enormous orange tubba bubba cat. The one who wanders around the entire house in the dead of night, carrying around dirty socks in his mouth (yum, right?) and meowing THROUGH them very loudly about this totally bitchin' filthy sock he found and you guys are missing all the fun and why's it so dark in here anyway and I sure could use a good solid spanking right now because THAT IS HOW I ROLL.
... yes, he's totally saying all of that. And more. Every single night. Did I mention loud?
# posted by
Michelle : 5:07 PM
You played Anita! EEEEE!
I think everyone who has ever been involved in any kind of singing/theatrical endeavor goes through that period of thinking no matter what you do, you're not good enough, don't look right, etc. It's especially bad in theatre because so many roles seem to require a bitty actress, who can be lifted, etc. by the male lead. I think it's crap they didn't let you wear heels though. One of our community theatres just did WSS (and another is doing it now), and our Anita was taller than our Bernardo, and we put her in three-inch heels anyway. I am sorry you did not get the rad heels, and sorry that some of the fun was ruined for you due to being worried about how you looked onstage. That pain: I feel it.
Re: Siamese Cats + Talking.
Yes. Yes, they do. All the time. About everything. Just as your stream of consciousness for Toby indicates. But, if he is like mine, once she got used to to new home, she shut up doing it all night. I think it took a couple of weeks, but she did get used to it and shut the heck up. Until then, many nights I found myself forced to overnight her in the BATHROOM HILTON.
# posted by
Ali : 5:14 PM
!!! 5'9 and...I didnt get past the 5'9 part. Are you really 5'9??
I feel like I just saw a movie star and they are like way taller than I imagined. heh. How amazingly perfect for theatre/movies acting if you were size six and 5'9, a dream bod if I ever heard it!!
Gwen,
you know whats funny? I always picture myself fat, I'm chubby but not fat but I see my self in pictures of just last year for example and I see that I'm normal and I think "why did I feel so fat there? " I feel myself feeling uncomfortable when I'm next to people.
But I know why!! I found out its becuase I'm super critical and analytical and I'm harder on myself than I am others. In my head I see others as normal, and myself as huge. Odd isnt it how our brain does that? I think we judge ourselves so much harsher than others judge us.
Much hugs to your inner child who was hurt and awkward!
-Pixielyn
PS
But seriously I'd totally show your kids, explain to them your feelings and HOW WRONG YOU WERE. They are feeling the same exact feeling as you, they need to hear that its normal!!!
# posted by
: 9:02 AM
I thought Toby looked Siamese right away - one of my friends had a Siamese who looked almost exactly the same. And he was one annoying cat. Very cute and friendly, but super annoying if you wanted any quiet time.
# posted by
: 9:51 AM
Oh yes, and considering that I am 5'3 and wear a size 6, you were definitely hot.
# posted by
: 9:52 AM
Moira: Thank you. You're very kind.
Michelle: Ha! Your cat sounds hilarious, with his dirty sock talk fetish.
Ali: Are you a musical theater veteran, too? Or a current performer? There should be a support group, don't you think? :)
Toby's pretty smart, it seems, and he's already figured out that we like to sleep in silence. Not a peep last night. I noticed he kept trying to take naps yesterday afternoon. So we kept waking him up. They're like babies, I guess, in that you should keep them up in the day time if you want them quiet at night.
Pixie: I really used to be 5'9", yes, before I gave birth to three kids and they shrunk me down to 5'8" and a half. (I think my pelvis literally sank half an inch.) My mom is 5'11", so I come by it honestly.
I agree with you that kids need to be talked out of the self-hate, and that so many of us are way too harsh on ourselves.
Honestly, being so thin and then gaining SO much weight and then losing half of it back, over all these years, has totally broken me of the self-hate habit. I did the same thing as you, a long time ago: saw myself in an old picture and wondered why I used to hate my body. And now I'm pretty much over it. I like myself fat, I like myself thin. I like the person I was then and the person I am now, thank God.
I tell the kids all the time that they're beautiful, because they are. I *try* to instill that in them, but everybody has to go on their own little journey, right?
Anon: I'm glad you said he looked Siamese to you, too. I was starting to think I was imagining it.
Starbuck is our bitch anti-social cat (and we do love her for that), and Toby is our comedy relief. He's the kids' dog, really. That's how I look at it, so it's okay if he's louder and more demanding.
I'm sure, at 5'3" and size 6, you are very awesome. I don't want to be 6 (and hungry!) ever again. I'll leave it to y'all shorter peeps, as nature intended. :)
# posted by
Gwen : 10:21 AM
My mother insisted on having Siamese cats when we were growing up (and then, by the way, complained about how non-cuddly they were) so I quickly learned that if a cat has even a drop of Siamese blood, it will be predisposed to howl at the least howl-friendly times available.
One of my cats is like Toby with the late night songfests. It makes me want to beat him to death* with his own shoes, if he had any shoes. Which he doesn't.
I think he just wants to make sure I'm alive, he's alive, and that I know he's eating at 3:23 A.M. so I can come watch him because there is, from his perspective, nothing more interesting than that.
I was a size 8-10 all through high school and college. And I thought I was fat. I'd love to be a size 10 now. Size 8 seems like a unattainable fantasy from where I stand.
*I kid, I kid.
# posted by
Jane G. : 12:02 PM
I have to say that you are so right about the stomach getting old first. I remember eating big, hearty meals late at night in order to go to sleep, now if I eat after nine, I'm up all night.
# posted by
: 1:41 PM
About the aging digestion - you forgot to mention the gas.
Toby looks like a champion lap warmer. I do love a really big cat.
# posted by
ellen : 6:25 AM
Hey...I thought my comment went through...*is sad*
# posted by
pudding-monkey : 11:59 AM
I don't understand - how could being 5'9 and a size six POSSIBLY mean that you were fat? I don't understand! That's, like, healthy size, unless I have my American sizing mixed up again. Which I'm pretty certain i don't. Crazy.
(I've been reading for a while and meaning to post. You're awesome, by they way).
# posted by
Smudge : 9:40 AM
size six on me a 5'0' is a healthy size slim. But on a 5'9 person that must be downright skinny. Its so funny because my very skinny 14 year constantly tells me how fat he is. No that isnt funny, whats funny is that we all feel it and we all mentally think we are larger than we really are!!! Its not about what others say or think but rather a self perception.
Good subject Gwen!
thnx.
I've been having mini talks with my son about self perception vs how others see us and hw we actually look. Good stuff.
-Pixielyn
# posted by
: 9:38 AM
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