March 2008

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Vaginas and Me

If you know anything at all about me then you probably already know that my pal Maria Niles is going to be interviewing Eve Ensler on behalf of BlogHer. And if you know anything at all about BlogHer then you know we’re asking members of the community to help Maria create the list of questions to ask Eve Ensler. Which leads me to a problem.

I cannot ask Eve Ensler a question. I had the same difficulty years ago when I had to come up with questions to ask Germaine Greer.

As I said in my comment on BlogHer, Ensler is the kind of woman I don’t want to ask a laundry list of questions to. I want to sit down with her over coffee and have a conversation. This is probably not a great idea since I’m sure that conversation would lead to me doing a vagina interview of my own. She’s probably a little tired of that, don’t you think? It’s embarrassing but I don’t think I’d be able to stop from giving her a vagina interview.

I’ve seen the Vagina Monologues umm eight times? nine times? ten? I don’t know, I’ve lost track.

I’ve seen it three times in NYC, once in Vancouver, once in Atlanta and at least three times (or is it four? or five?) here in Gainesville.

I’ve seen it with TW and the almighty Hobbit. I’ve seen it with my mother and my two oldest daughters and a waitress at our favorite restaurant who needed some serious positive woman energy.

I’ve seen it “off Broadway”, I’ve seen it in a UU church, I’ve seen it at a University and I’ve seen it in a bar.

Katherine Helmond was amazing in the Vagina Monologues, I saw her perform them twice (or maybe three times.) Elvira Kurt was hysterical.

We own the audio version of the book, two copies of the book and I’ve seen it on TV. We own The Vagina Warriors and more Vagina Monologues and VDay tshirts than I can count. (Viva Las Vaginas and Vagitarian were huge hits at BlogHerCon.)

I can recite most of the monologues word for word, not because I made an effort to learn them but because I’ve lived them. And, and hearing someone say “the flood” or seeing a “white Chevy Bel Air” do not mean what you think they mean. We no longer shop at the local craft store because of a nasty comment a clerk made about TW’s Reclaiming CUNT t-shirt.

My children have grown up with The Vagina Monologues and they are still growing up with The Vagina Monologues. Michelle has a 101 things in 1001 days list and performing “My Short Skirt” is on her list of thing to do. I’m so proud. We do a lot of talking about vaginas.

Ask Ensler a question? Where would I start? It’s impossible. And if I did manage to find a place to start, I wouldn’t be able to stop.

My vagina can be very chatty.

Go ask Eve a question. Your vagina wants you to.

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Chanel Belle

Chanel's last Christmas I tagged this picture as “Chanel’s last Christmas” but it wasn’t. She held on for another 15 months or so. She had some pretty rough days and we probably should have let her go a lot sooner than we did. But man, it was tough to take her to the vet today and say goodbye. A lot tougher than I thought it would be.

And as tough as it was to say goodbye, it’s been just as tough going about our day without her. Who knew a tiny little old smelly mostly incontinent cocker who spent 23 hours of the day on a blanket could leave such a hole when she was gone. But she has.

When we take Jake outside, we instinctively look toward the dining room to see if she’s going to consider getting up and following us outside.

We keep leaving the garage door open, because that’s what we did when she was here – because it could take her ages to make her way from the dining room to the backdoor, even when she didn’t forget what she was doing and stop in the middle of the kitchen to figure it out.

When we’re outside with Jake, and it’s time to go in, we look for her to see how long we will have to stand there with the door open so she can make her way inside.

There are two bowls full of dog food in the kitchen. She didn’t get up off of her bed today until we forced her out at 9am and then she laid back down until we carried her to the car at 9:30. Jake hasn’t touched either bowl, and who knows whether that’s his old age or his confusion over not having Chanel around. Hard to say.

It’s weird to work all day and not have that geriatric mostly incontinent dog smell under your feet as she wanders from underneath TW’s desk to underneath mine and then back to her bed in the dining room.

TW had trouble cooking tonight without her. She’s used to having to do a weird dog dance to avoid stepping on the mostly deaf, mostly blind dog who wasn’t able to avoid getting stepped on. TW doing the dog dance without the dog… just wrong.

If Chanel’s first family (the family who lost a child while living at McGuire AFB NJ in 2000) happens to do a google search for Chanel or Big Jake… we did take good care of her, and we miss her.

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