Qué sera, sera

Again, it's been too long since I last wrote. I actually wrote a few drafts, but never finished them so I deleted them. I'm listening to the rain pour outside my window. I can't sleep, thinking about the essays I need to finish, other things I need to take care of. I think of friends, and friends that don't seem so much like friends anymore, or friends I used to have. What constitutes a friend? Someone you can rely on? I don't have very many of those. Someone you feel that you can call and talk to when you feel down, or up? I probably have even fewer of those. Someone to call spontaneously to go out for a drink? No. Everyone has their own thing going on, whatever that thing is. Usually a spouse and/or kids. Or they're not interested. Listen to me. What a mope! I daydream of when I will build my house. What the foyer will look like. The living room. The media room. The kitchen. The gym with mirrors on opposite walls to check my form while doing yoga or dancing. My master bedroom with a walk-in closet and 5 piece bathroom. My tranquility room that overlooks a garden and floor-to-ceiling windows. A library filled with my books and my Gramma's books. Some people have a detached garage. I want a detached bar so the smoke doesn't permeate the rest of the house. I think of having Sarah, and Steven, Fransheila, and Frances with me. What their rooms would look like. What our lives would be like living together, me raising them. Getting Sarah into the very best schools. Going to Steven's soccer practices. Taking care of the babies. Cooking them healthy, wholesome meals everyday, instead of the crap they live on now. Teaching them all things they won't learn in school, like how to balance a checkbook. Although that is kind of becoming passe. How to pay bills online. Sarah and I doing yoga together. Steven and I throwing a football to each other. Or vice versa. I'll have special areas for my cats; inside and out. Maybe have two or three, or four dogs. Gardens. Maybe even an alpaca or two and make yarn from their wool, and blankets and scarves and sweaters and socks from the yarn. Just sittin' in my rocking chair on the front porch knittin' me some socks. Turn into a country granny by the time I'm 40. And then there's my practice. Despite my dreams of living in the country (but not too far in the country), I still want to be an abortion psychologist. Even though I'm far from starting a practice, it gives me a sense of...peace...to help people, or to think of helping people in the future. To help women who really need it. Then, of course, I want to become more involved in abortion rights. I want to work with politicians to secure rights for all women in the country. Make it a damn amendment. I've thought of becoming a politician myself, but I want to be a psychologist more, and I don't know if I have the fortitude to be a politician. I hope to god the political environment is better ten years from now than it is today. What nut jobs. And pansies. It's a house (and senate) full of nut jobs and pansies. I think it's worse now than the fifties. I know how I want my future to turn out, but will it be anything like that? I guess it's up to me.

What is Women's Studies?

More than one person posed this question to me, and I've found it more difficult to answer than I thought. I first reply, "Well, we study women." Like, duh! I then get a blank expression, so I ramble about what I've done in my Women's Studies classes so far, and they seem to turn away with the same blank expression. Some people just don't see it as that important. I might as well be majoring in Liberal Studies, which was my first major, and nothing wrong with it, might I add. I've studied the different feminist movements, the intersectionalities of women of color (including Native American women naturally), different classes of women, lesbianism, patriarchy, biographies, women in the US and all over the world, have read articles written by women of each movement, women for and against feminism, lesbians, women of color (sometimes lesbians of color), scholars, activists, writers of all generations...there is just so much. Not only have I learned a lot about history in general (opposed to just history about women), but also about current issues that women still face. I originally thought I lived in a fairly egalitarian society, but quickly learned how wrong I was. It's proved difficult to create a relatively concise answer that stresses the importance of this subject and why it deserves more attention, and is a viable subject to study. I remember when I told Bill a few years ago that I wanted to major in Liberal Studies, and he called me a copout. He'd probably feel the same about Women's Studies. I thought (and still think) that people with a degree in Liberal studies were more well-rounded because they received a more well-rounded education, and had more options available to them in the work field, opposed to someone who studied only one subject. I actually read an article confirming my belief, and that employers actually preferred to hire people with a liberal studies degree. Then there are wonderful people like Paul who told me that this is important and there needs to be more women like me, and he wants his young daughters to look up to women like me. Bill can go fuck himself.

I've done all this writing and haven't gotten anywhere. Women's Studies is the study of women subjectively and objectively in regards to history, race, ethnicity, sexuality, religion, intersectionality, politics, patriarchy, marriage, motherhood, economics, profession, their varying oppressions, in the US and abroad, primarily by women of all different walks of life, including the color of their skin, their sexuality, their education, their class, their beliefs, their profession, and their generation. I'm sure I'm missing a thing or two, and think I can condense it. I also need to add so that we can understand their past and their current situation and oppressions for women as a whole and different social groups. It's not enough to just say you're studying it, but why you're studying it. Oh, I did forget one small thing. RIGHTS. Silly me. Women's Studies studies past and present women of all sexualities, colors, race, professions, classes, regions domestic and global, ethnicities, and their....no, no. Women's Studies studies women, dammit! It is a comprehensive objective and subjective study of past and present situations and movements of women as a whole in this country and worldwide and in certain social groups such as race, sexuality, and class, and in light of certain subjects such as rights, oppressions, feminism, and patriarchy to better understand history and current conditions of women and society, including oppressions women still face today, and how to eradicate those oppressions. I'm still not completely happy with it, but I'm getting there.