Category Archives: Uncategorized

Amusing synchronicity

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Noah and I normally don’t really agree about what clothes look good on me. He is inherently biased towards the non-skinny chicks (I’m not really complaining) and that means that he appreciates how I look in clothes that I don’t think I look good in. I’m all biased by society’s standards that it is my job to be skinny or doomed to ugliness.

But! We have found a way we both appreciate how I look! I’m *thrilled* that I am looking more and more pregnant. I’ve been waiting for this for a very long time. Now when he says, “I think it looks great–but it makes you look very pregnant” I squee. Usually when he says I look great I doubt him. This is awesome.

Job irritation.

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I hate parents. Ok, that is too broad. I hate the parents of my students. Ok, still too broad. I hate the parents who are sending me obnoxious emails. Ok, that’s fair. No, I will not go back and change your kids grade on the last progress report because he made up an assignment later. No, I cannot have a meeting with you Monday morning to discuss the fact that your son has had an F from the beginning of the semester. (WTF people, what do you think I do all day?!) Whining, bitching, and moaning is just nuts in my classes right now and I want to beat children over the head with sticks. Hates them all I does. Ok, not all. Some of them are just silly/obnoxious and I get to squirt them–that makes my day better.

I am going in to work today because of a parent conference and to help some kids catch up on work. I don’t really want to. I’ve been taking Fridays off and it is going to hurt that I worked five days this week. I have next Friday scheduled off and dear-lord I will need it. I can’t miss any other days next week because I have conferences scheduled with the kidlets during class all week and I am not physically up for making them up after school. 🙁 Only 14 more days until vacation. There are only 19 school days left in my contract.

The sophomores are trying to talk me into making the final just vocabulary–they keep claiming it is so I will have an easier time. Horse pucky I say. The lazy gits don’t want to have to actually study.

Come! Take our stuff!

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Taken from the Noah…

This Sunday, December 9th, we’ll have a big pile of stuff, especially books, that we don’t want to move and are looking to get rid of. There’s likely to also be alcohol, novelty juggling bags, decorations and whatever else we look at and say, “I’m *not* moving that three times in the next year.”

We tend to be early risers, but don’t show up before about 8am. We’ll be here to give stuff away in the morning and afternoon ’til about 3pm. First come, first serve, take it by the armload or carload.

Possibly more details as we figure out what we’re getting rid of. Possibly not, and it’ll just be a grab-bag. Hope to see you then!

Edit: there will also be clothing (at least some uhm fun sorts of stuff because I don’t wear it enough to keep it anymore), one or possibly two TVs, and old computer monitor, one or more bookshelves, a couple of small table-type furnishings, and no doubt more.

{my shit} Interesting feelings observations.

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In the interests of fair warning: if you offer unsolicited advice that I don’t want to hear I may simply delete the comment, I may take you off this filter, or I may unfriend you entirely. Sharing similar experiences doesn’t generally feel the same way to me but weigh carefully in your mind how you think I might feel about receiving the comment given that I am getting a really large amount of unsolicited feedback. It isn’t that I despise any all feedback/comments it is just that I don’t need any more messages telling me what to do right now.

I have noticed that lately I am experiencing far more shame reactions to things. I suspect that a lot of these are springing from indoctrinations about who/what I “should” be as a parent and as a person. Even the fact that lj comments are sometimes bothering me and I don’t know how to handle them is causing some serioius shame reactions. I think mainly because I have been getting angry about a lot of things, often even things that normally wouldn’t set me off. Given that I have a lower than average bar for becoming irritated this is pretty noticeable and significant. Almost every time I get angry I mentally (and often verbally depending on who is around) go through all of the things that my sadistic/mean-spirited mind would really like to say/do in response to whatever stimulus is currently getting to me. I rehearse it and visualize it several times until I feel almost like I *have* done whatever mean thing and then I feel guilty then ashamed that I am the kind of person who does that sort of thing… even though I didn’t actually do it. Even thinking harsh things is enough to set me into a spiral where I am convinced that I am an awful person who deserves every bad thing in the world. This is intensified significantly if I share those mean-spirited vents with someone I think of as close and they tell me they don’t approve or that they express that what I am thinking is awful. Then it just seems to be confirmation that I am indeed a disgusting awful person who deserves whatever thing set me off in the first place.

Example: recently someone IM’ed me to tell me, “OMG you are HUGE” after seeing me at Dickens and being unable to actually talk to me. What I actually said to this person was, “I’m going to do you a favor and explain to you that pregnant chicks don’t like hearing that any more than non-pregnant chicks. You should rethink that comment.” We went on to have a conversation about how he didn’t know I was pregnant and felt excited and wanted to kind of comment on the experience and we worked through a better way of expressing that. This conversation took a while as he was multi-tasking and slow at responding. My immediate mental response started going through various catty ways of responding to this and being that I am big on chatting with several people at once I IM’ed a couple of people and talked through possible responses to this that were far less constructive and my favorite was “So are you. I’m pregnant, what is your excuse?” (Note: person in question isn’t actually huge or particularly fat.) But I had a moment of sadistic glee wanting to be more defensive than I actually was. I shared this mean potential response with a friend who did not find it funny and said that I might cause mental damage to someone if I said this and then proceeded to long-windedly tell me all the ways that I “should” respond. Me being me, I first got pissy because I don’t like being told what I “should” do in a judgmental sort of way. Second I felt upset that this person thought I would actually say that. Third I felt like there was a judgment that I was a bad person for even *thinking* a response like that. This all cycled down really fast. This was a few days ago and I still feel shitty thinking about it.

That’s a really good example of the kind of situation that is leading to feelings of being disgusting/bad/awful/terrible/mean/etc. My reaction is out of proportion. I’m aware that my reaction is out of proportion yet I can’t seem to stop it. Interestingly my therapist thinks that saying something like that when I get those sorts of comments is just fine because I have no need to be polite to someone who was not polite to me. (I picked a great therapist for my personality type.) We also talked about how people are telling me I shouldn’t smack the hands of the belly-touchers and she offered to print up cards saying, “If you touch me my therapist says I get to hit you” and put her business card on the back so I can hand them out as explanation *after* hitting people who touch me. (Have I mentioned I love my therapist?) On one hand I feel like it is entirely justifiable that I want to smack the hands of people who reach out to touch me (and geezus-fucking-christ people it isn’t like I am slapping anyone in the face) because words are too fucking slow. On the other hand I feel the weight of society’s messages telling me that if I were “nice” I wouldn’t do those things and I feel wave after wave of crushing guilt that: Look! One More Example of why I am a horrible bitch and no one should like me.

When I’m really honest I know that at least part of the crushing guilt is coming from the low overall rate of support I’m getting from people I talk to. Most people who bother to comment to me at all about these topics are telling me that my instinctive defensive reactions are inappropriate and people are going to fairly great lengths to convince me that I am wrong. Even Noah is neutral/apathetic about these topics and so doesn’t qualify as much support. So I feel like I am fighting an uphill battle against all the people who think I am horrible and if so many people think I am horrible I must be. (Like Rebecca’s fucking horse analogy.) It doesn’t help that I am having more contact with my family (strangely neutral to positive) which makes me feel more vulnerable to all of the old “you are bad” tapes anyway. I wish that I could actually see my therapist every single week because most of the time it feels like she is the only real consistent serious cheerleader I have in my life but things keep happening that necessitate canceling appointments. I’m feeling very alone and unwilling to talk to people more because when I do talk to people they tend to tell me what I am doing wrong and what I should be doing instead. Thanks, I can sit at home basically silently by myself and feel like shit without any help from anyone else. The internet tells me often enough that I am a bad person–traveling for the privilege seems dumb.

{inner circle} Why stay?

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Some of the conversations I am having around the DHP are showing me why I don’t really need to stay in CA. I’m not slamming anyone, it’s ok that people have other priorities in their lives. It’s just making me realize how few people I actually consider friends. It isn’t that I am the best person about making it to events–I’m really not. Usually my reason for not going to events is that I am too tired to make it out of my house. I’m not trying to claim this is a morally superior reason. In fact, the people who have told me they would love to come to the DHP only X, Y, and Z are going on the days before and there is no way they will have the energy–that I really get. But “I already have plans with X friend I see every week” is… something I notice. I don’t think it is bad. Everyone needs to pick priorities and making sure that you follow through on solid commitments to the people who are your good friends is a wonderful thing. But I know that I am not one of the good friends.

Once upon a time I had a very active social life. If an event invitation was sent out I took it as a given that I would be going to the event. I didn’t prioritize much beyond “who sent the invitation out first” because I wasn’t actually close with 98% of the people doing the inviting. My life changed. Now I try hard to make it some events because I genuinely love the people and I skip everything else. This means I rarely go out. I am losing contact and priority among the people who have only been acquintances anyway. And my world has shrunk more quickly than I would have thought possible. I’m actually really ok with that.

There are people I am going to miss a lot. The funny thing is, some of the events I prioritze going to now, I will fly in for in the next few years because they are high enough priority. I’m really not going to miss the rest. And now that I am not going out constantly and people know that trying to fuck me is a futile effort I’m really not someone to draw a crowd the way I used to. That’s ok. Learning who your friends are is important.

Balance

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For all the difficulty involved in pregnancy there is so much good in it as well. I am talking to the Lizard more and more because now the child can hear me. We are having some good, though one-sided, conversations. I’m talking to the baby about my hopes and dreams for myself, and for him/her. I am telling the child about some of the pitfalls involved in dealing with me and with Noah. I’m trying to give the baby a head start on dealing with such a prickly mom.

I love looking down at my stomach and noticing the changes in my body and how they portend bringing life into the world. It’s interesting how I don’t exactly regard this as a “miracle” because it is a biological process yet it is still amazing. I get to do something that transforms a tiny piece of me, and a tiny piece of Noah, into an entirely different person. Noah has said many times that he wants to meet someone who is a piece of me and a piece of him. Thinking about that makes me smile, even when I hurt.

Holy Socializing Batman

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I got out of the house. On three days out of the four days off. The first day I wasn’t feeling so hot so my socializing mostly consisted of breathing the same air and reading a book while huddled on a couch. Luckily my friends love me. Yesterday we got to a party for a couple of hours. I mostly sat on a couch while Noah talked graphic novels. 🙂 It was good anyway.
Today I remembered that Mr. tigman was in town and going to Dickens Fair. We were going to need to go this weekend or next anyway so we ambled over. We saw so many people. We saw some *good* people. I only had once dance in me so I saved it for my favorite dance partner. Of course it rocked. He didn’t go nuts on spinning me. 🙂 It was amusing telling the other random Fezzi’s fellows that they don’t want to dance with me because they don’t want to wear my lunch. I wouldn’t have put it so bluntly if they hadn’t been so pushy. I got to tell a bunch of people not to touch my stomach. It was amazing to me that people I never talk to or see already know I am pregnant. Apparently the grapevine speaks my name. We got to see other peoples’ babies. Yay babies! My friends make friggin cute kids. Of the six and a bit hours we were at Dickens we were sitting pretty still for more than three hours of them because I wasn’t doing so hot anymore. We stayed to see Naughty French Postcards. We shouldn’t have, the show was extremely uninspiring. Oh well. It was neat talking to people and seeing who said that they would absolutely be willing to come out to Pittsburgh to see me/us. I have a very strong appreciation for being able to look around my life and know who will be in my life no matter where we live.

And now I pay the piper. Physically I am a real mess. I need to go to bed in a big hurry and try to let my body rest. Even though I am likely to be sick pretty much all week for this, it was so worth it. I have some great people in my life. Now, to sleep…

Thankful

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I love to watch him sleep. He is so beautiful in repose. I look at the character that remains in his face even as he dreams. I love how broad his shoulders are; how easily he shoulders burdens with them–both his own and those he willingly, even eagerly takes from me. I like that his body is soft and comfortable to curl up against. I love the whimsy that lead him to get a barrel of monkeys tattoo.

I love that he can forgive me anything. I love that he will do anything for his friends, even as that same habit drives me crazy sometimes. I love how completely he gives himself over to lusting after me. I love that he embraces the changes in my body as beautiful in recognition of the life we created together. I love that he tolerates my mood swings and often difficult temper. He gives of himself more freely and openly than any person I have ever known. I love how he loves me with the open eyed glee of a child being given the best toy in the world.

What I am thankful for is that he was willing to humble his pride and ask me for a second chance when I was too afraid to ask him. I am thankful for the gift of him in my life. It is a rare day when a fight is bad enough to cause me worry about whether this will really work out. Even in those moments I am still grateful he asked for the chance.

Life or something like it.

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This whole moving thing requires that I somehow find the energy to pack. Have I mentioned lately that I hate packing? Does anyone have boxes?

Christmas is looming in that way that it does. I think we are actually mostly done with the shopping we want to do. With luck the remaining things can be found online so I can shun that evil place… the mall… Here’s hoping.

Con stuff is not going so well as I would hope. Between the people who moved away, the people who flaked (love that one of them was telling his girlfriend he was still involved–mad slick that move), and the people who are just not fucking responding to email despite the fact that we need their fucking piece of work to move on… I just want to scream. That said, once I get responses from the last round of emails I am pretty sure I am done with programs. Now to create the class matrix and send out confirmations and pertinent information to people. With luck that will be done in the next week. (I say luck, really it depends on me feeling human for multiple days in a row.) Although one thing this con has done is reminded me just how much Jon, Erik, and Sarah rock. I wasn’t ever really doubting, but right now I am fucking thrilled with them. (Look at the website! www.tngcon.org Erik did that! He rocks!) See, one should always remain friends with one’s ex’s. 😉

I am still only barely hanging in there with teaching. Everyone wishes I was nicer and my only response is, yeah and I wish I didn’t feel like shit 24/7. And I want a fucking Oompa Loompa. We don’t get what we want in life. 🙁 I’m trying really hard to be nice. It just isn’t going so well as normal. I’ve been looking around my classroom and thinking about the fact that in the next month I need to take things down from the walls. It will be sad. I seriously moved in to this room. I’m going to miss these memories.

Noah is riding the waves of hormonal freak outs spectacularly well. A couple of bumps were very unpleasant all the way around, but I think that being on the other side of those bumps is better in every way so it’s ok. Having the best boy in the world is a really nice feeling.

I miss being social, but I don’t see how more of it can possibly happen seeing as my window for social on most days is about two hours long. That will probably improve come January when I am not working anymore. Holy cow the kids suck energy like mad.

We are looking at flying out to Pittsburgh in January. Noah figures that exposing me to the freaking cold during the coldest month of the year is fair warning. We are also going to try and figure out a little bit more about where things are located and what parts of the city we actually want to live in. Brrrrrr.

This weekend we get to drive up to Napa and pick up Noah’s wedding ring. We decided that after a year of marriage it was time to get around to getting him the ring we had been talking about getting. We found a really neat jewelery up there on accident and it has been in process for a while. Maybe I will get around to posting pictures of my ring as well when we get his and we can show how perty and cute and matching like they are. 🙂

Sleep

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Amusingly, apparently I can sleep. I can sleep starting at 7:30 pm. I can wake up four times during the night to pee and never be awake for more than about 15 minutes so I got at least 9 hours of (broken) sleep. And I’m still so tired I feel like I could walk into a wall. My tummy hurts and I’m whiny.

I am having horrible nightmares all the time. Weird, random nightmares all the time. Thankfully Noah doesn’t mind being woken up to comfort me. It is looking more and more like there is no chance of me going part time. That means six more full-time weeks till I stop working. Four of those weeks are before Christmas break and then the two weeks after are review and finals. The four weeks are going to be a little tough physically but if I wuss down what I am teaching I think I can do it. The two weeks of finals prep and taking exams is no big deal. That means I will get paid until February due to having my paychecks divided up over the year instead of just the months I am teaching.

Babbling. Out of it. Tired. Ugh. Not feeling good. Is today over yet?

{the girlys} Why I married him.

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He came home from work early for reasons not having to do with me. I proceed to start babbling/crying at high speed all the stuff that has been in my head since last night. I explained the sheer overwhelming magnitude of how many ways and to what degree I am giving up *my* indpendence. I asked him if he has ever stopped to consider what I am giving up. He hadn’t. I asked him if I have complained or whined or railed at the gods about how unfair it is. He said I haven’t at all. He then sat and thought about this and said, “Well it is starting to sound like there are a few things I need to suck it up about.”

We then discussed in more detail that if he wants to take the charity of Tao money and blow it on other things then he just doesn’t have the money to give to friends or political organizations or whatever. But he can do it. This seems to be enough for him.

When he has been a butthead in the past few hours I have a hard time remembering that he is ever not a butthead. But then he goes and acts like the complete opposite of a butthead and I remember why I married him. Thank you all for listening to me vent and not overreacting along with me.

Small gratitutes

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Support from the girlys. Love my girlys. Phone call from my Julia. Single best thing about moving to Pittsburgh: being only three hours drive from my Julia. Sweetie you are going to get so sick of me. Offer of solution to potential problem from Sarah. You so get my shit. My work buddy didn’t manage to salvage my lesson plans, but he tried really hard and that counts for a lot.

I’m trying to think of more. If I manage I may update.

Edited:
I’m grateful that Noah is not a douchebag. And that we now have pie.

Rob says

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“Dear Rob: I have eight distinctly different voices in my head. There’s a hurt, oddly puffed-up voice that complains about everyone who has ever done me wrong. There’s an hysterical voice that nags me with the thought that nothing I could ever do or say will make any difference to anyone, so why bother. Then there’s the still, small voice. It has more gravity and feels more honest. It gives me useful instructions about specific things I could do to live a more meaningful life. The only trouble is, the other voices always blabber so loud I tend to neglect the only one that’s actually helpful. Any advice? – Drowned Out.” Dear Drowned: Set aside five minutes each morning and five minutes before bed. Whisper “Shut up, all the rest of you!”, and then listen reverently to the still, small voice.

I’m not even sure there is a still, small voice inside me anymore.

{the girlys} More festivity.

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First: thank you all for the comments. I really appreciate the acknowledgment right now.

Last night ended up being one of our Marathon Processing Nights. The nights I use as evidence that I married a Berkeley dyke. Most of it went reasonably well. I finally got him to see the difference between saying, “I don’t like it when you are nasty about Tao” as opposed to, “Why are you ALWAYS so nasty about EVERY girl I know better than you do?” The latter just makes me feel defensive and angry because it isn’t bloody true. I came up with a huge laundry list of names to prove that it isn’t true. He had a lot of trouble accepting it at first but eventually grudgingly saw the difference. Then we turned to talking about his frequent loud pronouncements that EVERYTHING he tries to do to deal with problems fails. Uhm, that isn’t true because we are not having many of the problems we had two years ago. Obviously things have been fixed. The problem is there isn’t one big one size fits all solution to all problems that can be set down on problem after problem and that pisses him off. He hates that each individual problem has to be dealt with as a separate case. I finally yelled at him (in a Denny’s, so classy “I’m not one of your fucking computer programs where you can fix a dozen bugs by fixing one line of code.” Strangely it helped.

So that was all incredibly festive but actually lead to resolutions so it was ok. We had agreed yesterday morning before work that we would do the “What does money mean to me” exercise my therapist recommended after work. So we got to come home from about two hours of processing to that. At first it seemed like the exercise wasn’t going to be very helpful cause we already know most of what we wrote about. I was torn between being amused and being irritated that he described my set of expectations/experiences about money as looking like someone who grew up around Columbian druglords. Dude, is that your only understanding of poverty? Don’t you see how money is power and control fucking everywhere?? Eventually the conversation became focused on how he sees having money as having independence. This lead to a huge battle in which he wants to have money set aside for him to spend however he wants without consulting me. Because he feels like he is losing all of his independence if all of the money is “ours”. Well, bitch, you are the one who wanted me to start thinking of it as “our” money. You have pushed and pushed and pushed. I have given up my personal claim to the part of the money that I am bringing into the household right now as preparation for when none of the money will be mine. He wants to set aside money that will be “his” and that will be “mine” for us to spend in whatever ways we see fit. Uhm, we already spend this money. Why do you need it to be specifically labeled and set aside? What do you gain from that? He gets to not have to consult me anymore–he gets his precious independence. Let’s ignore the fact that the basis of my independence since I was 14 fucking years old has been that I support myself. I get to give that up to stay home with our kids, but he doesn’t give up any of his independence? Oh–he will *choose* to *let* me call part of his money my money and that will make it all better? Fuck you. That isn’t my god damn money. I didn’t earn it. So he said that taking care of the kids and the house is work we would pay someone else to do so why not pay me to do it. I almost turned around and said, “Some people pay someone to get laid. Are you going to start paying me every time we fuck so I can be your whore as well as your nanny and housekeeper?” I didn’t say it. I started crying instead. I left the room and cried in the guest room for a while. Then I took a bath and cried so more. I had a really hard time not cutting. Then I slept in the guest room all night. That bed is the one thing in this house of any serious value that is *mine* so if he wants to fight about indpendence that is the closest I have to any of my independence left.

Before I left the room crying I realized that at this point I am pretty trapped because of the baby. I could keep working even with the baby, but I really don’t want to do that to my kid. So I told him that I never thought I would ever regret getting pregnant. That’s when I left. I haven’t talked to him since. I stayed home today. My head hurts so bad it feels like it might explode. My stomach is in knots. My throat is tight and achey. What in the fuck am I doing?

{the girlys} Frustration

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There are exactly six people on this filter. You are the women I trust to a)listen to me vent and not let it color your opinions overall b)give me advice when I ask for it and not when I don’t want it c)understand that mostly right now I am freaking out because I am pregnant and not because something is basically broken in my life.

Noah and I are fighting a lot about things we shouldn’t be fighting about. He has a lot of friendships based around him taking care of people. I have an incredibly hard time with this. I have an even harder time when those friendships involve him giving them money/buying them things. I’m angry because it feels like this is a threat to my long-term security. We have reached a more stable place on this front thanks to advice from Crystal–he now has a yearly budget on how much he can give away. He’s not thrilled that the amount is as low as it is, but oh well. It’s all that I feel comfortable with.

Today we got into it because he brought up a book he wants me to read. We need to buy a new copy because he loaned his copy to one of his ex’s and she got rid of it. This is the second book she has done this with. Ok, books aren’t that expensive but the actual monetary value isn’t the point. She doesn’t think about how her actuons will affect the people around her. She treats her husband like shit. She treated Noah like shit when they dated. What am I supposed to think about her? He has another friend he has been talking to more lately and what he has told me about her is even worse than the freakin ex. Why shouldn’t I think of these women as bitches? The problem is that he wants to bring them up and talk about them and I am supposed to be friendly and warm. I can’t do it. I’m hostile. But that isn’t ok.

I keep telling people off. Everything I have been thinking for years I am saying. I feel like I should just shut up and yet I can’t seem to keep my opinions to myself.

I’m feeling miserable all the time. I’m tired of feeling this way. I’m tired of whining and bitching and not going out. I want my body back. I’m tired of feeling pressured to have sex because if I don’t Noah is an asshole. I don’t know what to do right now. I feel so dead inside.

Me being involved with an open invite party seems like a recipe for disaster… oh wait…

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(Yes, I’m aware that some of you have seen this 5 times in the last five minutes. Take that as a sign of our high esteem of you and don’t bitch. 😛 )

Noah quite pithily says:

Since Krissy (now my wife) and I are moving out of state next summer, and selling our house sooner yet (this time for sure!), we’re having a final DHP before the house goes away. Since we’re leaving the state (no, not permanently) for Christmas, we’re calling everybody together on December 15th.

In the spirit of nostalgia, and *not* because I’m too lazy to put together a full invitation, you can see the usual details on the previous invitation — “http://www.angelbob.com/houseparty.html”. This party, though, is for December 15th. Yes, the one in 2007.

We’ll have food and beverage, naturally. There will be paraffin and 151 for firebreathing. We’ll see if we can’t get our hands on a pinata. Hot tub. Drunkenness, nudity, fire, and all the usual (I’m trusting you guys here — don’t make me a liar). And hey, there’s no excuse to put off attending this time, ’cause after this, no more Disaster House!

Invite your friends. Invite your enemies, at least if they’re more interesting than your friends 🙂 What you don’t drink, we have to move! So ask me to mix you a drink at your peril…

Why December 15th? What, you mean *other* than the release of “The Sound of Music”? Or Netscape 1.0? Well then, let’s say “the birth of Nero,” or if you liked Nero, “the death of Walt Disney”. Togas remain optional. Togas plus mouse-ears, while optional, will have you looking more stylish than… Um… if you wore laurels on your brow with that little silly red-pants-and-suspenders thing with white buttons a la Mickey?

Questions and Answers

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On Friday I was just not up for the lesson I was supposed to be teaching. Of course I felt massive guilt about this, but my students comforted me by telling me that they are content waiting until next week because if I wait until I feel better to do the heavy stuff I will teach it so well they will get lots out of the lecture whereas if I push myself when I am distinctly under the weather they won’t get as much. Such sweet little manipulators.

So I told them to get out a piece of paper and write down any questions they have that they have always been afraid to ask. They can get anonymous answers so no one has to feel silly or stupid or ignorant. I maintained absolute discipline and fierceness through the answering–no one got to laugh at a question they thought was stupid because it was probably hard for someone to get up the nerve to ask.

The questions ranged from silly/stupid/trying to get a rise out of me to fairly deep questions to things that are probably scaring the shit out of them. I answered everything completely bluntly and honestly and straighforwardly with no sign of shame or hesitation. It went remarkably well. I can’t remember all of the questions (there were probably a hundred or so) but here is a sampling:

Can you get AIDS from oral sex?
What is phone sex?
Does sex hurt?
How young is too young to be a parent?
My sister is 12 and likes to pretend she has a penis and that it hurts her just as much as it hurts a boy when she is hit between the legs–what is wrong with her? Is she stuck in the toddler phase? (We are studying Freud and his phallic obsession stage blew their little minds.)
Why did you want to be a teacher?
Why are you moving away?
Why don’t you want to stay with us?
How many times a week do you have sex? (I was a little funny with this one–I told them not as often as I used to because it is uncomfortable right now.)
Can a transvestite make a baby by itself? (They didn’t understand the difference between a transvestite and a hermaphrodite so I told them and I explained what being transgendered or transsexual is as well.)
Can two transvestites have sex together?
Why are boys such horndogs?/Why do boys have urges?
Are all men perverts?
Are there teachers who hate kids? If so, why do they teach?
Do you hate any of the teachers at this school? If so, who? (I declined to give names but I did say that there are teachers I don’t have much respect for.)
What _is_ love?
What makes a boyfriend different from a good friend? How do you know when you are ready to have a boyfriend?
If my boyfriend wants to kiss another girl, should I let him or should I dump him?
How can I stand up to my super oppressive parents?
Why do some guys ejaculate so quickly?
What is testosterone?
Do the carpets always match the drapes?

That’s all I can remember right now. There were some really stupid ones that I didn’t bother to answer because they were just being silly. I frequently prefaced my answers with statements about how I have my beliefs about these subjects and my beliefs are very different from what many other people think and it’s ok that we don’t agree. I am not trying to convert anyone to being like me, I just want the kids to know that opinions like mine exist and they should be aware of that. (Though it would be nice to convert the kids. 😉