Grieving Losses

One of the things I've been doing on and off over the last several months (whenever I have a block of time to reflect back on my childhood, or whenever I think of something quick to jot down) is keeping a list of "losses" that I've experienced.

I have come to realize that I have a lot of difficulty allowing myself to feel any emotions deeply, or even acknowledge what emotions I have about something, because I have fallen into the habit of ignoring/avoiding/repressing these things instead. It's a common coping mechanism to get through a difficult situation, but not something (most psychologists agree) that should be continued indefinitely. If you can't deal with something at the time, it's okay to set it aside for later - but eventually, that "later" has to happen. And this is my "later."

So I've been going through and typing up a list of life experiences, focusing especially on the negative ones I suspect I never fully allowed myself to feel/mourn at the time, or in the subsequent years. Instead of acknowledging them and allowing myself to figure out how that experience made me feel and what (if anything) can be made of it, I've just been ignoring them, not thinking about them, or thinking about them in a minimizing or mocking manner. ("Oh that wasn't a big deal. It's not worth thinking back on now." "Oh, everything is fine; it's always been fine." "Ha ha, look at this embarrassing thing that happened to me - wasn't that stupid? Wasn't I a klutz?")

The purpose of this exercise then, is to NOT minimize or mock. I write down everything I think of - even something that seems silly, or irrelevant, or insignificant, or childish. I allow myself to remember the event and acknowledge that it happened to me. I want to get into the habit of allowing myself to feel frustrated or upset or embarrassed or angry if I need to. I want to get into the habit of acknowledging emotions instead of hiding them or trying to immediately change them into a different emotion. They don't have to be big things. They just have to be true.

I call it "grieving losses" - though it's not always grief, and it's not always technically a loss. Often, though, it is. The loss of childhood, the loss of what could have been, the loss of a grandparent, the loss of friendships, etc. Growing up is full of losses. It's a normal part of growing up - but just because it's "normal" doesn't mean that it's not significant to my life, and an important part of who I've grown up to be.

The more I started writing them down, the more I realized I had. I also started to see patterns - things that happened to me over and over. I won't share all of them here because there are too many of them (there are almost 50 pages of them by now, typed, and I've only covered my life through high school, not counting anything from the last decade) and because many of them are very personal and not something I want to share. But I do want to share some of them, in case you're interested to see what this looks like. I recommend doing this yourself, reflecting back through your own life and seeing what losses you might have that you never allowed yourself to fully grieve. Everybody has losses - it doesn't mean you had a "bad" life, or a "bad" childhood. It just means you're human.

Anyway, here are some of my "losses":

1. Medical/physical losses, including broken bones and illnesses that temporarily impeded my ability to do things I wanted to do. For example, in seventh grade I fractured my wrist and had to wear a cast. I wasn't allowed to play on my basketball team while my wrist was in a cast. I also fractured a bone on three other occasions - when I was three and I jumped off a chair and fractured my foot, when I was in 4th grade and fractured my shoulder from slipping on some ice, and in 9th grade, when I fractured the same shoulder. In 4th and 9th grade, I had to wear a sling on my left arm. Anytime I had a sling or cast, there was also a sense of embarrassment, where everyone would demand to know what had happened and I felt I had no choice but to laugh it off like it was no big deal. Before other kids could laugh at me for being a klutz, I "headed them off at the pass" and laughed at myself.
2. My grandfather, who I was very close to, passed away from cancer when I was in 2nd grade. There were obviously a lot of losses associated with that - not just the physical loss of him being gone from my life, but the loss of what could have been, which I still feel on occasion. How different would my life have been if he'd been around for more of it? On top of this, I felt that I wasn't mourning the way I was supposed to - because I never really felt the urge to cry about Grandpa's death, even though I knew I was supposed to be upset about it - and so I felt ashamed at my inability to cry.
3. I really wanted to go to school when I was younger, and begged my parents to let me go. I was not old enough to start Kindergarten by the state standards, so the public schools wouldn't let me register. My parents took me to several private schools to take their entrance tests to see if any of them would let me start, even though I was a year too young. I passed the tests easily (I could already read and write on my own), and I started going to school. This doesn't seem like a loss - I got to do exactly what I wanted to do! - but upon further reflection, I think this is one things (out of many) that contributed early on to my senses of not being good enough, or not being taken seriously. From a young age, I felt I had to prove myself - to prove that I was smart enough and advanced enough, to prove that I belonged where I thought I belonged. School was a privilege, something I had to earn. I knew I was ready for school, my parents knew I was ready for school - but I had to convince other adults (and the kids who were a year older than I was) that I was capable. Furthermore, it wasn't enough that I be an average student - I was trying to prove myself, so I had to be even better than all the other kids were, so people would stop questioning whether or not I should be in that class. This continued through a lot of years of schooling. I had this constant need to show that I not only belonged in my grade (whatever grade I was in at the time), but that I was one of the best students in that grade, regardless of age. I worried that people thought I was too young. Even when I was obviously advanced in reading or other academic subjects, there were concerns that I was not "socially mature" enough for the grade I was in. My 5th grade teacher wanted to hold me back from starting middle school, and have me repeat 5th grade - not because I wasn't academically ready for middle school, but just because of how young I was (and how young I acted). There are other examples, too. Even though I always somehow got around these age-suggestions (by going to a private school for a couple years, by having my parents agree with me that I could handle middle school and should not be held back, etc.), the fact that these concerns kept coming up affected me. There was always a voice in the back of my head wondering if maybe those adults were right - maybe I didn't belong, maybe I wasn't good enough. 
4. I went to three different elementary schools - a private Christian school for K-1st grade, my local public school for 2nd-3rd grade, and a different public school for 4th-5th grade, to take advantage of their TAG (Talented and Gifted) program. Every time I changed schools, I had to leave old friends behind and learn how to make new friends. I learned to not take friendships or relationships for granted; I knew they were transient things that could easily be lost or altered by changes in circumstance.
5. Similarly, having friends or neighbors I was close to move away, and losing friendships that way.
6. Feeling that I didn't belong, in a variety of situations including church youth groups and cliques at school. This is something everyone struggles with to some extent, I know - but the commonality of it does not diminish how much it hurt at the time. For something so universal, growing up sure can be a lonely experience.
7. Arguments with friends in middle school. In one case, this led to the loss of a friendship, which was never fully repaired. In another, it led my other friends to "force" the two of us to sign a peace treaty so that we would get along when we all hung out in groups. I understand where they were coming from (and if they wrote their own "grieving losses" lists, perhaps concerns over our prolonged argument would make the cut for stressful experiences in their own lives), but that does not negate the fact that I once again felt like I was not being taken seriously. The continued unity of our friend group was more important to them than validating my feelings, and I was talked into putting the argument behind me without any real resolution for it, simply because others wanted me to get over it.
8. National tragedies, like the Columbine shooting and 9/11, both of which I became aware of and impacted me as a middle schooler.
9. Having an appendectomy in seventh grade - which not only included the loss of a few days of school (including dress rehearsals for the play I was in), but also included another instance of me not being taken seriously. When I woke up in the middle of the night screaming and unable to move due to the pain in my stomach, the nurse that my mom called insisted that I was just experiencing my first ever bout of menstrual cramps, and that all I needed was a warm bath. When we went to the doctor's the next day, many doctors didn't believe that I could have appendicitis, because my descriptions of the pain I was experiencing were "too textbook" that they thought I had read a list of symptoms somewhere and was only reciting them, lying about what I was feeling in order to get out of school or something else I wanted to do (never mind that I never wanted to get out of school - I loved school!). Thankfully, they performed the surgery anyway, and I felt a lot better (physically) afterward.
10. Several specific incidents of being teased (by family members, by adults, by other kids). I was especially attuned in middle school and high school to mean comments about my appearance or my weight, which I worried about (as many teenage girls do).

The list goes on, but for the sake of brevity, I'll end there. You get the idea.

By allowing myself (however belatedly) to recognize that these things were indeed losses of one sort or another, and by allowing myself to feel angry or upset about them, I am practicing changing my go-to habits. The hope is that, in the future, I will be less likely to let bad experiences, traumas, or even just the natural, small losses of growing up/being human simmer under the surface for years. I will acknowledge them as they come and allow myself to take the time necessary to 1) figure out what I am feeling about the event, and 2) actually feel that way.

It can be hard to be an adult if you are still stuck in your childhood - and you can't get "unstuck" from your childhood until you look back on it and figure out what things you've been carrying around all those years.

It's not a "quick fix" - just compiling the years of memories I've done so far has taken me months, completed in small pockets of time here and there when I have it - but I think it's something worth working on, which is why I've continued to add to it whenever I get the chance.

Dear Fellow Liberal White Women

Dear Fellow Liberal White Women:

By now you've probably heard the statistic. 53% of white women voted for Donald Trump on Tuesday, while only 43% of white women voted for Hillary Clinton.

This statistic has been the catalyst for articles like this one from the Huffington Post, which accuses white women of not caring enough about sexism, about their friends of color, about the LGBTQ community, and other marginalized groups that Trump has bullied, belittled, unsettled, and threatened during his contentious campaign run. These articles attempt to shame white women. The message is clear: this tragedy is your fault. You should know better. You should do more.

What is less clear is the intended audience. Is the article talking about the white women who voted Trump? They would seem to be the most directly culpable - and yet, they're hardly the ones who are going on Huffington Post the day after the election, heartbroken and searching in desperation for answers as to how Hillary lost. So is the article actually talking to liberal white women? Liberal white women who perhaps knew conservative white women, but didn't "do enough" to convince them not to vote for Trump, or not to vote third party?

Why is the article talking to women at all?

As if women - the victims of the patriarchy - are the worst offenders. As if because they witness sexism, they should "know better." (Isn't that called victim blaming? If you were talking to a rape survivor, would you ask why she let herself be raped? No. You wouldn't.)

This article is hardly alone in casting blame unilaterally, in failing to understand what is actually happening. Even before election day, it was rampant. In an email chain going around my husband's liberal, Jewish family, a relative wrote, "Remember: a woman voting Republican is like a chicken voting for Colonel Sanders."

To us liberals, it is obvious 1) that sexism exists, 2) that sexism is a bad thing that needs to be eradicated, and 3) that the Republican party only perpetuates sexism. But those are not givens. Conservative women do not see those statements as fundamental truths. They do not understand that voting Republican is contributing to their own oppression. And blaming them, or trying to shame them into understanding that is not a tactic that is going to work.

Those white women who voted Republican? I know them. They are my family members, my Facebook friends, my ancestors, my neighbors. Hell, I was once one of those women. It was the environment I grew up in. And if I hadn't had some liberal high school teachers, if I hadn't gone to college, if I hadn't taken Women's and Gender Studies classes - it's likely I would still be one of them.

I know those white women. And I'm telling you - they are not monsters. They are not stupid. They are not mean-spirited or vindictive, and they did not vote for Trump because they don't care about other women, or people of color, or disabled people, or members of the LGBTQ community. Even the ones who were most enthusiastic about Trump did not love everything about his rhetoric. They made excuses for his poor language choices, his misbehaviors, his bullying - rebranding them as antics, as "speaking his mind" - because they liked him for other reasons.

They are not monsters. They are victims. They are victims of the patriarchy, same as us. There is no "perfect" victim. Some recognize sexism and do everything in their power to try to fix it. Others recognize sexism but don't prioritize fighting it. Still others don't even recognize sexism at all. They don't know they're victims. That doesn't mean they aren't victims - just that they don't know they are.

These white women who voted for Trump live in suburbs, in rural areas, where everyone smiles at each other instead of leering. They've never seen an obvious example of sexism in their everyday lives, because they are privileged in other ways (by their skin color, their religion, their country of birth, the language they speak, their sexual orientation). They have always (or mostly) felt personally valued by the men and other women in their lives; they've always felt respected and loved. Their oppression is familiar, a comfort, and they do not recognize it for what it is.

They recognize that there are differences between the genders - both innate and learned - but they don't see this as oppression. They easily fit into the criteria our society has developed for womanhood, and so it is not of their concern for them to be kept in that box. They like the challenge of juggling double standards. They don't even realize they're juggling them.

They like pleasing people. They like taking care of the men in their lives. They are peacekeepers within their families. They do what is expected of them because it is easier that way, or because they like knowing that they are doing all they can to keep their families running smoothly. They like knowing what they are supposed to do. There are traditional gender roles, and as long as they follow them, their lives are pleasant, tolerable.

When they are catcalled at the grocery store, they take it as a compliment. Because they have been taught to take it as a compliment. Because they have been taught that men are allowed to "act like men."

They rationalize and make excuses when Trump (or anyone else) brags about sexual assault, describes women in vulgar terms, or indicates that women are put on Earth for the sole purpose of men's desires - whether that be for her to let him have sex with her, or for her to make him a sandwich - because that is what they do everyday of their lives. They have seen their husbands, their fathers, their brothers, their sons, their friends act the same way and say the same things. They believe (they hope) that their men don't mean anything by it - that it's just silly, that it's fine, that it's the way things always have been and the way they always will be.

They would never dream of working outside the home - because they don't need to, because they don't want to, because they firmly believe that they are not supposed to.

They feel the double-bind of working outside the home and childcare. They feel guilty if they spend too much time at home with their children - they wonder if they should be at work, modeling for the next generation that a woman can do both, that a mother can have a wider range of influence than just the tiny sphere of her home. They feel guilty if they spend too much time at work - they wonder if they should be home, taking care of their children and doing housework, as their mothers and mother's mothers and mother's mother's mothers did. They want to "have it all" and they want to prove that they can "have it all." They think, "All these other women do it. Why can't I? It must be something wrong with me. Me - not the system, or the unfair double standards, but me as an individual. I am the one who is failing."

They don't like to be called a Feminist, because men don't like women who are Feminists. They don't like the idea of rocking the boat. They would rather be the one who smooths hurt feelings, rather than the cause of it.

When they see oppression, they deflect it. They think: "That wasn't what I thought it was." They think: "I was wrong." They think: "This isn't systematic oppression. It's just a one-time thing." They think: "Maybe that woman deserved it." They think: "Maybe I deserve it."

They are Christian, and they believe it when men tell them that the Christian God once decreed that women are inferior to men. They believe that the best thing they can be is someone's daughter, someone's wife, someone's mother. They define themselves - gladly, willingly - as belonging to someone else. They don't feel qualified to stand alone, to be independent. They don't have high enough self-esteem to believe that they have value outside of their interpersonal relationships.

The world has favored men for so long that they assume this is simply the way things are. Men wouldn't be the heads of religion, the heads of government, the heads of households if it weren't supposed to be that way. Life is just harder for women. It's okay. It's what God intended. They think, "God gave me this cross to bear, this cross of being female. And it is up to me to be strong enough to bear it." They tuck their feelings inside, until their feelings disappear.

They have been objectified and condemned and violated. They have been beaten and emotionally abused and sexually assaulted and raped. But they don't want to think about it. It happened a long time ago. It doesn't matter anymore. Best to forget about it.

They blame themselves for tragedies that have happened to them. When their husbands beat them or yell at them or control their money or threaten to leave them or threaten to separate them from their children, or use any number of psychological and emotional and physical abuse tactics, these women wonder, "What did I do wrong? What did I do to provoke him?"

They don't want to act like a victim. They don't want to be upset with their lot; they don't want to cry, they don't want to be angry. They've witnessed sexism everyday of their life, but choose not to acknowledge it, because it is easier to bury their heads in the sand. They have a series of defense mechanisms - defense mechanisms they aren't even aware that they use - to keep them from understanding that women are still second-class citizens, to keep them from understanding why Feminism is important.

Their husbands, their pastors, their Fox News anchors tell them to vote Republican. These women hear that "women's issues" are special interests. They are told that there are more serious issues at stake - issues like immigration, or the economy. Issues that effect everyone. Issues that effect men. Issues that effect Christians. Issues that "matter."

They are tired. They've never fought for their own freedoms before, but it looks exhausting. They've tried fighting before, and it got them nowhere. They see the writing on the wall. They think change is impossible, improbable. They see other things that are easier to change, easier to fight for - and so they focus on those other issues that they care about, the ones they have come to believe are more important to focus on.

They have other things in their lives, other priorities. Being a woman is only a small part of who they are. They have jobs that consume their time, or children that consume their energy. They consider other things when deciding who to vote for. They know they can handle sexism. They've been surviving sexism since they were born; they can do it for another 100 years. It's all they've ever known.

They still live with their parents. They live with their husbands. They live with their children. They live in a nursing home. They are intimidated. They are scared. They have different opinions than their families. They keep quiet.

They worried what a Hillary presidency would do to men. They worried that it would make their fathers, their husbands, their coworkers more intolerable. They worried at the personal backlash that they might witness, or be victims of, in their work spaces or in their homes. They didn't want to have to see the men in their lives suffer under a female president. They've been living under male presidents their entire lives, but they know that men's egos are more fragile. They are frightened of the die-hard Trump supporters, of what they might do if Hillary is elected. They think Trump might actually be the safer choice, because Trump would keep America closer to the status-quo.

They are new mothers, exhausted from late night feedings. They watch Nick Jr. all day, not the news. The information that reaches them is filtered, distilled, distorted - if it reaches them at all. They trust their husbands, their parents, their pastors, who seem to make good points, who seem to know what they are talking about. They adopt the convictions of others because it takes less energy than to figure out what the issues are and how they feel about them.

They are elderly women, more afraid of what will happen now than what will happen in the future, a future they won't live to see. They've seen Republicans and Democrats come and go. They think, "Is one decade really so different than the next?" They have the wisdom of their years. They know that their day-to-day won't change much from one president to the next. They've seen the country survive wars; they know that we can survive anything.

They were sick of an election cycle that lasted two years. They were sick of the arguments on their Facebook feed. They cannot stand conflict. They try their best to smooth it over. They shut politics out of their world because it makes them ill, because they have already enough stress in their lives, because it only brings them heartache, because they don't have time for it, because they are told that their vote doesn't matter anyway.

They have never had enough confidence in themselves to trust their own opinions. They have never been nurtured and given the chance to form their own opinions. When they raise their hands in class or try to speak up at work, they are ignored in favor of their male counterparts. They think, "I must be stupid." They think, "Women must be stupid." They think, "What do I know about politics anyway?" They think, "What do women know about politics anyway?"

They are enthusiastic about Trump.

They are reluctant about Trump, but voted for him anyway.

I understand that some of these are contradictory assertions. But "white women who voted for Trump" is not a homogenous group any more than "white women who voted for Hillary" is. In fact, I have felt many of the above things myself, cycling through them throughout the day - using whatever thought patterns or behaviors are necessary to deal with the Sexism of the Moment, to calm my cognitive dissonance enough so that I can survive my day.

White women who voted for Trump, white women who voted for Hillary, white women who voted for third party candidates, white women who didn't vote at all - we are all the same in that we are all victims. We just cope with it differently.

I wanted Hillary Clinton to be the next president. I was excited at the idea of my future children looking at photos of presidents in their history textbooks (or, let's be honest, a Wikipedia article), and seeing, after a long line of old white men, a black president and then a female president. I was looking forward to telling them, "I voted for both of those presidents. My generation was the one who gave America Barack and Hillary back-to-back." I did not vote for Hillary solely because of her gender - but make no mistake that representation matters. I was looking forward to being represented by a fellow woman.

Tuesday night and Wednesday morning were heartbreaking. Maybe it's always this heartbreaking when the candidate you really wanted to win does not win - I don't know. This is my third presidential election, and the first one where the person I voted for lost. I have a feeling, however, that this is a particularly heartbreaking election to lose. Because it wasn't just one candidate against another candidate - but two very different sets of ideas. And the man who I saw as representing sexism, racism, homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia, and ableism was the man my country chose to elect as our next president.

It hurt. Of course it hurt. I cried Tuesday night, and I cried again Wednesday morning. I check my blood sugar every morning because I have high fasting glucose, and Wednesday it was higher than I'd ever seen before - 151. I immediately looked up on my phone if stress can effect blood sugar. It can.

But I wasn't just crying or stressed because the president I wanted to win did not win, or because I was afraid of what President Trump might do - to women, to minorities, to immigrants, to LGBTQ individuals, to natives, to everyone - though of course both of those worries did factor in. One of my greatest reasons for crying, however, was mourning. Mourning what could have been and mourning what is.

Hillary Clinton would have worked tirelessly for everyone. She knows that all women are victims of the patriarchy, even those who do not recognize their status, or those who try to ignore it, or those who (willingly or unwillingly) participate in perpetuating their own oppression. She would have bolstered the status of all women - even those who fought her tooth and nail, even those who did not want her help, even those who did not see what she was fighting for as "help" at all.

But that is not what we got. I knew several of those white women who were voting for Trump, and yet I still allowed myself to believe that we would not end up with Trump as our president-elect. I believed (naively) that enough women had come to recognize their oppression, vowed to fight it, and prioritized that fight above the other concerns in their life. I was wrong.

It deeply saddens me how many women willingly participate in their own demise. I don't like the joke my husband's relative said ("Remember: a woman voting Republican is like a chicken voting for Colonel Sanders") - not because it isn't true, but because of its flippant tone. It's not funny that Republican women believe in their second-class status. It's heartbreaking.

I know a lot of liberal women (especially women of color, for whom the symptoms of oppression are so much more obvious that it is hard to fathom how anyone could be blissfully unaware of them) are angry at the white women who voted for Trump. It is easier to be angry at people than it is to be angry at the system. But it is not their fault.

Not all victims are capable of recognizing and fighting their own oppression. The women who are blind to the reality of the world? The system made them that way. The women who follow all the patriarchal rules? The system made them that way, too.

Sexism works very hard at keeping women from recognizing their oppression, and at denying them access to the resources that would help them fight it. It has to. Women exist in equal (or slightly higher) numbers than men; sexism would not have endured for so long if it was not successful in those goals. Of course women perpetuate their own oppression. They were raised to.

I am not trying to make excuses, or say that people who voted for Trump (or who voted third party) should not be held accountable in some way. I don't know what that way is, but I can't think going around blaming demographics is going to do any good. You're not going to convince the white women who voted for Trump that they did something bad. You're probably not even going to convince them to label themselves Feminists. For many, to become Feminist would be to give up the one thing that has made their oppression, their lives bearable. Christianity, God, gives them hope and strength when times are shitty. How are they supposed to understand that it is also part of what contributes to their lives' shittiness?

Shaming women, telling them that they are supposed to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, regardless of the cost done to the personal lives, is not only unhelpful - but also anti-liberal. Lumping everyone together into demographics without considering their personal stories is counterproductive and insensitive both. It is not a very good way of getting more people enthused about politics - on the contrary, it will make these people angrier and less interested. They will disengage even more, they will deflect further into the oppressive Republican camp.

We need to come together, not pull each other apart.

Scarab Club Exhibition

I'm pleased to announce that one of my paintings, "Silk Caution," has been selected for the juried "Blooms, Bugs, Beasts" Exhibition at the Scarab Club gallery in downtown Detroit!

This 22"x30" watercolor painting was completed as part of my Eastern Michigan University senior honors thesis series in 2009-2010. It was also recently included in a French-Canadian art documentary TV series "L'Art Erotique" on ARTV (February 2016). For analysis on this painting (and the other works in that thesis), search the "thesis" tag on this blog or read my thesis here.

The Exhibition runs from Wednesday, May 18 - Saturday, June 25, 2016. There will be a reception Friday, May 20th, from 5-8 pm. The Scarab Club is located at 217 Farnsworth St. in Detroit.

Hope to see you there!! :)

Poems and Song Lyrics

As a kid/pre-teen, I fancied myself a songwriter. I've always liked to sing (even if I'm not naturally great at it), and I've always liked to write, so it seemed obvious to merge the two. I wrote little songs and then went out in the backyard and sat on a swing and sang them. I sang them for myself. I didn't share them with anyone else - except occasionally my best friend (who has legitimate singing talent). A lot of the songs were written on separate pieces of paper, or torn out of journals and then rewritten in again at a later date, but I tried my best to recreate them and put them in a general order.

These are all from middle school and early high school. Some are just me being silly, and some are just being overly dramatic/maudlin, because I was a teenage girl trying to be emo and a songwriter, but others exactly pinpointed how I felt. Some of them even still ring true today.

What I think Heaven Will Be Like

Streets of red carpet lead me to his throne of gold

So many dreams on this silver lining that never get old

My eyes are blinded by his presence

So light, so bright, beautiful essence

Long white robes, with silver sashes

No one smokes here, no trays of ashes

Lavender flowers in my hair

Some people aren’t here – not fair!

But they got a chance

God gave them a gift

If they chose to ignore it

They won’t be lift (ed)

No psychics, freaks, or fortune tellers

No spirits, enemies, or soul sellers

Just the believers

Heaven

Untitled

I’ve been busy

Getting dizzy

All wound up

In the things of this world

I should be telling the Word

‘Til evil’s heard

But I’m bad

So make me a better girl

Change my body

Save my soul

Cleanse my mind

Get on a roll

Fix my life

Help my heart

Lend a hand

And do my part

Attitude adjustment

New testament

Lord, forgive me

I repent

I am free

Breathe

Back up

Break up

What’re you trying to do?

Smother me?

Leave me

Let me breathe

Inhale

Exhale

But you’re in my face

Like a plastic bag

You need a warning label

Keep out of reach from children

This product can cause suffocation

Handle with care

I need a breath of fresh air

For crying out loud

Let me loose

Cut off the leash

Let me go

Let me breathe

You

I’m only human

But I try

To do my best

I’m trusting You

To do the rest

Help me, please

For I am a mere mortal

And You are God

Today Ain’t Like Yesterday

Today ain’t like yesterday at all

Days creep by like school in the fall

The universe’s too big

And we are too small

Today ain’t like yesterday

Today ain’t like yesterday at all

Yesterday the day was full of fun

Yesterday we flew towards the sun

But today is cold and full of dread

And there’s a storm cloud in my head

So today ain’t like yesterday

Vision

A dream will die

No lie

If you don’t feed it

A dream will go

You know

If you don’t need it

Without vision

People perish

Day doesn’t dawn anew

Without vision

People perish

Smoke, flame, ash, too

A Lonely Song

All I ever say is “au revoir”

Sitting here strumming my guitar

All I ever say is “so long”

Singing a song

A lonely song

Mortal

I’m not supposed to feel

I’m not supposed to care

So why am I worrying?

I should be above this stuff

This human emotion

I’m better than this

I can’t possibly have

Stooped down so low

As to love you

Look what you’ve done to me

You’ve changed who I am

You took an uncaring person

And made me mortal

Maybe One Day

Maybe one day I’ll be a star

Maybe one day I’ll play guitar

Maybe one day I’ll go far

Maybe one day I’ll be who you are

But for now I guess I’m stuck being me

Maybe one day that’ll make me happy

Maybe one day I’ll be proud of myself

Maybe one day I’ll like the cards I’ve been dealt

But for now I guess I’m here

Sitting here, hoping that

Maybe that one day is near

From the Outside, Looking In

You’re on the outside, looking in

I’m on the inside, looking out

I don’t know how you perceive me

Can you tell me what this is about?

I can only see myself when I gaze in my mirror

While you can see me from a new perspective

You’re father away, maybe, not as near

But you can see me still, so tell me – I’m no detective

I may see myself one way

But does that show in what I say

How do you see me?

Tell me!

I don’t know what shows

From the outside, looking in…

A Stupid Mistake I’ll Make

Cosine theta times sine two beta is something I can take

But on the last line: two times nine – a stupid mistake I’ll make

A gourmet lunch, a buffet brunch is something I can bake

But I hate to boast, ‘cuz with toast – a stupid mistake I’ll make

Why? Oh why? I cry! I try!

I do my best, but on the rest

I’ll always make a stupid mistake

Instead of a smoothie I’ll make a shake

Instead of a pond I’ll call it a lake

Instead of asleep I’ll stay awake

Instead of a diamond I’ll buy a fake

Instead of a shovel I’ll grab a rake

Instead of the gas I’ll use the brake

Instead of some cookies I’ll make a cake

Instead of Jack I’ll call him Jake

A stupid mistake I’ll make

Purple Phone

I got a purple phone

And it sits all alone

On my table

Hey don’t get up to leave

C’mon you gotta believe

This ain’t a fable

Yeah, it’s true

I dyed it red and blue

And now it’s purple

Oh, oh, it’s purple

I got your number here

But I just can’t dial it

With my phone sitting there

Looking so violet

It’s screaming to me

“It’s not meant to be!

Don’t call Uncle Urple

‘Cuz I’m perfectly PURPLE!”

Try So Hard

Why do I try so hard?

Why do I care so much?

Why do I want this so bad?

When do I know when enough is enough?

This seed I planted years ago

Has decided to start to grow

But it’s taking over every part of me

I can’t have fun without feeling guilty

And this once-happy goal

Is taking over my soul

I’m at a crossroads here

After all these years

I’m sick of beating myself with my fist

I’m tired of being a perfectionist

I try too hard

I care too much

I want this too bad

Enough is enough

Raindrops

These are raindrops

Falling on my face

What do you mean it ain’t raining?

There’s rain all over the place

Can’t you see those dark clouds

Up high in the sky?

‘Cuz it ain’t me. I ain’t gunna cry.

These are God’s tears –

Not mine

So stop asking me how I am

I’m fine

Don’t tell me I’m a basketcase

These are just raindrops

Falling on my face

Momentary

Who I am now, who I am today

Might be different tomorrow

‘Cause each new day brings

New hope and new sorrow

Why can’t I just stop time

And claim this moment as mine?

My life speeds by so fast

The future becomes the past

It’s too quick to make any sense

Can’t I just seize life’s little moments

I don’t want to grow up

I don’t care what people say

I’m happy right now

So can’t I stay this way?

Bittersweet

I feel so elated

No longer second-rated

This is the highest I’ve ever been

But while I’m this high

I could fall from the sky

‘Cause what goes up

Must come down again

Take this moment of clarity

And add my harsh reality

Change a paradise to a parody

Even the best of times

Are bittersweet

Why Roses?

I was recently contacted by a high school student who read my thesis and was wondering why I'd chosen to use roses in my watercolor paintings. I've touched about that a little on here already, but today I thought I'd share the response I wrote to her, since I go into the rose in more detail.

She asked if I used the rose for personal reasons, just because I think it's a pretty flower, or if I feel as though it best represents the female anatomy.

I replied:

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I don't know if I would say the rose *best* represents female anatomy. It has been used historically to represent female genitalia in some cases, but in other cases it represents purity, chastity, almost the *absence* of female genitalia/female sexuality. In Northern Renaissance art, the rose and lily both became popular symbols for the Virgin Mary - and her anatomy is only important as it pertains to her ability to act as a vessel and to give birth (both passive activities), but not to be used for sex or self-expression or anything that might grant her agency. Throughout the Victorian era too, roses were very commonly used as symbols of sexual innocence and purity.

(I talk more about the negative symbolism of roses on my blog -
untilthewaterfalls.blogspot.com/2015/09/negative-symbolism.html)

I liked that ambiguity - the fact that the rose has been used as positive symbolism and negative symbolism both. I think it widens the variety of interpretations viewers might see in my work. 

If the rose is a stand-in for sexual purity, and my watercolors show that rose being stabbed with straight pins, it could indicate a desire to eradicate sexual purity - that is, the antiquated ideas about chastity and the double standards of sexuality the different genders face. If the rose is, on the other hand, a stand-in for sexuality and female genitalia, then the rose being stabbed demonstrates the desire many people (unfortunately) have to continue to restrain female sexuality and self-expression. The patriarchy. So-called "meninists." Anyone who is desperate to uphold the current systems of privilege and oppression so that men continue to benefit and women are limited.

As for personal reasons, I talk a lot on my blog about my struggle to find and maintain confidence (with sexuality, but also just in general). Particularly in this post -

untilthewaterfalls.blogspot.com/2015/09/feminine-layers.html

"When I started this painting, I wasn't necessarily thinking of flowers as symbols for female genitalia; I chose flowers and I chose patterns for aesthetic reasons. But as I painted, and as I started thinking about what drew me to that aesthetic choice, and as I heard what others in my class were saying about the painting during critique, I realized that I could create a pretty powerful message (or, rather, pretty powerful messages - because I don't believe any art can be or should be interpreted in only one way, even if the artist had one specific way in mind) if I used that well-known symbolism to guide a viewer's interpretation in a certain direction."

"I painted this watercolor when I was 20 years old. I had only had one boyfriend (and still have only had one relationship, for that boyfriend became the man I married), and had very little sexual experience. I was - and often still am - ashamed and mystified by my own body and by the idea of sex. I did not know how to talk about it or what to think about it. I understood that it would be great, would be liberating, to have positive feelings about my body and about sex, but I was not there yet (and would argue that I am still not there today, six years later)."

And in this post -

untilthewaterfalls.blogspot.com/2015/09/silk-caution-poisoned-rose.html

"I saw sex (in general) and my vagina (specifically) as shameful and mortifying. Still, I happily, willingly, and actively participated in my own sexual repression because I thought it's what I was supposed to do, what good girls did, what good Christians did. I was even kind of perversely proud at the extent of my vagina's "purity" - that it had never even been besmirched by my own fingers or a tampon."

"And then I took a Humanities class my senior year of high school, and I learned about other religions and historical attitudes and I started considering the negative side of gender roles for the first time. And then, as I grew enlightened and liberated in my thinking, I also grew ashamed and mortified of my shame and mortification. I decided everything I had grown up believing was wrong. I decided I wanted to figure out how to use tampons and I wanted to have sex and I wanted to explore my body and find confidence in my sexuality and I wanted to experience an orgasm. I also decided that my Christian upbringing was at least partly at fault for the attitudes I had about myself and my sexuality, a realization that led to (but was not the sole reasoning behind) my decision to step away from Christianity. I realized that I no longer believed in God. I tried to have faith in myself, instead."

-

Though I don't mention roses specifically, I think it's clear that I was looking at the negative symbolism of roses. I've always liked roses and sort of identified with them, probably because of their connection with purity, chastity, sexual innocence.

Also, there was the simple fact that roses are easy to come by at any florist shop, so they were easy for me to acquire and work from. I do like their shape, and had some experience painting roses already, which was helpful. There are plenty of cultivated varieties to work from, which gives me a wide range of choice for composition, even while staying within the rose family. And because roses are so ubiquitous, everyone is able to recognize them.

As with any decision we make in our lives, there's not really *one* reason I chose to use the rose in my paintings.

Hope that helps! There's a lot more about my thesis on that blog too, if you just click around and read the blog posts with the "thesis" label.

Let me know if you have any further questions. :)

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I love talking about my artwork, so if you have any of you have any questions, hit me up! I'd love to start a conversation.

Expressing Emotion

In my effort to try to employ more daily positive thinking, I came up with a list of eight "affirmations" that I wanted to read every morning. I did not choose these words lightly; it was a process of going through old journals and figuring out the things in life that I did truly believe but often have trouble remembering - the lessons I learn over and over again because they tend not to "stick" with me (for whatever reason).

Of course, reading them every morning lasted about a week (if that). But every once and a while, I do go and reread them, and today I'd like to focus on two. (I'll get to the other six in later posts, as I have time.)

1. My emotions matter and are entitled to expression.

2. It is a relief and a joy to feel vulnerable around others.

What I mean with these is that "bottling up" my thoughts/feelings (in general or about a specific event) should not be my default. Instead, I should feel comfortable (especially around those I care about, and who care about me) expressing those thoughts and feelings.

I often downplay my emotions - to the point where I might not even understand how I feel about something, because I haven't let myself figure it out. If there's something exciting on the horizon, I don't let myself get too excited about it - just in case it doesn't work out. If there's something aggravating or distressing, I pretend I'm unaffected, that I'm "above" such things as the "weakness" of showing emotion (a topic that the novels I'm working on definitely addresses). Even if I'm happy - whether because of something I'm proud of, or because I'm sharing in someone else's happiness - I tend to "hold myself back."

I suppose this could be a genetic personality trait - there have to be some people who are just naturally less emotional than others - but in my case I definitely think it's learned behavior.

Honestly, I can't imagine anyone not learning that behavior. Men are told that "boys don't cry" and are discouraged from showing emotion (perhaps with the exception of anger, the only emotion seen as "masculine" in nature). Women not being told this does little to prevent the same result. The reason men are deterred from displaying emotion is because such action is seen as "feminine."

When "feminine" is an insult (as it is in our society), it doesn't really matter if you're a man or a woman demonstrating those traits - it's weakness. Men are supposed to be "above" that weakness because they are "above" women; but women too, if they want to be taken at all seriously, have to go to great lengths to distance themselves from such "weaknesses" and prove that they are not like "the rest of their sex" - as if all members of a sex, or any group, are ever identical.

I want to be one of the few, not one of the many. I want to be "great" - to be successful, to be understood as intelligent, to get at some core of the human existence that many fall short of finding, to "make a name for myself," to influence. In this country, in this world, in this era of history - the power tends to go to the emotionless. Our leaders are not compassionate; they're robots.

But what happens, then, when I do feel something, something that can't be buried under stoicism? More likely, it's not one thing, but a culmination of many - little daily annoyances or grievances or celebrations, all shoved down layer by layer on top of each other, until my heart is full and can't hold any more, no matter how trivial the thing. This is why I end up crying over a printer jam (it's always crying for me, whatever the corresponding emotion) - not because I think a misbehaving piece of technology is the end of the world, but because I haven't let myself acknowledge my emotions in too long, and this minor frustration is one time too many.

It is better to acknowledge my emotions as they happen. This doesn't mean crying over every little thing - because, actually, I find that little things don't warrant crying so much when they're acknowledged individually, periodically, every day. It simply means taking a moment and realizing that oh yes, this thing is frustrating me, or disappointing me, or upsetting me - or, oh yes, that is something I'm excited about, or proud of myself for, something that should be celebrated. It's not a thing worthy of a sob-fest (or a momentous party), but it's also not nothing, despite my tendency to treat it as such.

1. My emotions matter and are entitled to expression.

I word it that way so that I cannot argue it. If I were to say "I am entitled to express my emotions," it would be too easy for me to logic my way out of it on a day I was feeling down on myself. (Am I entitled to my emotions? Am I entitled to anything? Should I be? Should anyone?)

I picture "my emotions" as separate from myself, needy children that need to be acknowledged. I am doing them a favor by taking a minute out of my day and saying "Yes, I hear you. I see you. You're right - this is frustrating. You're right - this isn't fair." When I ignore the emotion, it still has power. When I confront it, accept it, acknowledge it - only then will it lose it's power so I can move on with my day. As Carl Jung said, "What you resist persists."

Of course, my emotions aren't tangible, real things that have feelings of their own. It's really myself I'm doing the favor toward. But I'm often more likely to do something if I think it'll help someone else, than I am if I think it'll help myself.

The second affirmation works in tandem with that first one - and does appeal to the idea of helping myself.

2. It is a relief and a joy to feel vulnerable around others.

If I am willing to be "selfish," and the first affirmation doesn't convince me to acknowledge my emotions, this second affirmation will do the trick.

This statement is evidence-based. Looking through old journals, it becomes clear that despite how anxious I am about "revealing" something about myself before I do so, it is always relief and joy I feel afterward - that once I am open and honest, once I allow myself to acknowledge my emotions and "be vulnerable" with my friends and family, the negative emotions disappear.

You'd think after this happening so many times, I would have realized this sooner and stopped getting anxious about sharing aspects of my life with other people. Instead, I have to reread this affirmation to remind myself; I have to use this affirmation to convince myself not to be anxious, and to just go ahead and share.

To be clear, I am not saying that "feeling vulnerable" is a positive experience - or something that should be done lightly. I am only saying that it often leads to better relationships, given that it is done in a safe, loving environment, and that looking back on the moment of vulnerability in hindsight I am always, without fail, 100% glad that it happened.

These "moments of vulnerability" take many forms. Voicing an opinion, admitting a feeling, sharing a story I've written or a favorite book that I've had a personal response to with someone that I trust, etc. Often, it is that I'm worried someone will judge me or think less of me if they know something about me - even something as mundane as "I sometimes cry when my printer jams" - but once I share, I find that others appreciate my sharing, relate to what I'm saying, and indeed, even feel the same way I do. It might seem insignificant to care about something so small, but it really is a relief to express frustration over a small, daily occurrence, and learn that I'm not alone in my reaction.

Rainbow Crassula

I decided to tackle a 8"x10" size colored pencil drawing because I was having such fun with them and wanted to do a slightly larger size. This one uses black Strathmore paper and eight different Prismacolor colored pencils - red, orange, yellow, green, light green, blue, light blue, and purple - for a colorful, rainbow effect.

This drawing is for sale through my Etsy shop for $59!

"Rainbow Crassula" - 8"x10" Colored Pencil Drawing by Andrea Arbit

Because there are so many layers of colored pencil on this drawing, it's hard to get a photo that's "true to color" - the glossiness of the layers reflects the light of the room and the camera. The pictures shown without the white mats show the colors more accurately. The cool white of the mats emphasizes the cooler green colors over the bright oranges and reds.

"Rainbow Crassula" - 8"x10" Colored Pencil Drawing with 11"x14" White Crescent Mat

The source material I used for this drawing was a personal photograph taken of a succulent garden in the Norfolk Botanical Gardens in Virginia. I tried to stay as true to color as possible, because I loved the bright colors of this crassula plant.

Step 1: Red

Here, my goal was to just get an outline of the succulents down so that I knew how everything would fit on the page.

Step 2: Erase

I erased the 2x2 grid I'd drawn on my black paper with graphite pencil, as well as the 8"x10" outline I'd measured. Now that I have my red layer down, I don't need them anymore.

I had to go through and re-add some red where the eraser deleted the red.

Step 3: Light Green

Because the green was the "undertone" underneath the oranges and yellows, I wanted to get that color down early.

Step 4: Purple

There isn't much purple in this drawing, but there is a bit blended in to the red on the edges where the red is darkest.

It's not really a "true" purple color - more of a red-violet.

Step 5: Blue

Again, I'm simplifying when I call this color "blue" - it's a blue-green shade I often add to green on black paper, for the green colored pencils on black tend to look too yellowish without darker blue tones to draw out the green color I truly want.

Step 6: Green

This green is not too different from Step 3, but it is a slightly greener color, not as yellow.

Step 7: Orange

Now that the green undertone is sufficiently layered, it's time to make it look more like the actual source material by adding a yellow-orange color.

Step 8: Yellow and Blending

Though I often like the contrast of black paper showing through bright colored pencils, it didn't seem to fit in this case, where the interior of the succulent plants weren't very dark. So as I added a bit of yellow (to blend the orange and green into each other), I also went back through and added more red, more green, more blue, and more purple, to fill in the black edges I wanted to get rid of.

Step 9: Light Blue Highlights

Finally, I added highlights. In the previous step, I used the yellow to outline some of the highlights on the edges of the petals, but I found that the yellow wasn't bright enough. Plus, I wanted to make parts of the background lighter, to mimic the white-ish colored rocks in the background of the source photo.

Instead of true white, I used a very pale blue. On black paper, they look very similar anyway, but I wanted that hint of blue to tie in the bit of blue that was blended into the green.

And here we are! Here are some images of the final, completed drawing:

(Remember that the above four were taken with a different camera, of the final product with the white mat, so the coloring isn't as "true to color" as the four photos below.)

Don't forget - this drawing is for sale through my Etsy shop!

As far as symbolism goes, where my flowers (are succulents actually flowers? or are they just plants? are those petals, or leaves?) stand in for sexuality (especially female sexuality) and/or the experience of life and humanity in general (especially womanhood and the "essence" or soul of that idea, or of a specific woman) -

I find succulents very interesting. These are plants that survive arid climates by keeping all their juices inside, plants that often have prickly spikes on their exteriors as defense mechanisms (though the plants in this drawing, don't in fact have spikes). You could interpret this as sexual - sexual repression, celibacy, perseverance in the face of adversity (abuse or assault, perhaps) - or you could interpret it more generally, as someone guarded, someone shy, someone reserved, someone who develops a thick skin, someone who keeps her (or his) thoughts to herself (himself).

These are often traits we deride (in America, at least, where we're all supposed to be gregarious and friendly and open) - but look how beautiful these succulents are! They're not ashamed of their nature. And they show so much of their beautiful selves - even as they choose to keep certain parts inside.