if she was a spice, she'd be flour*
Mar. 25th, 2021 01:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
brandywine28(*It's a Bob's Burgers quote, but rest assured, Louise Belcher was talking about me when she said it. I am flour. I'm eleven and a half pounds of it stuffed in a five pound bag.)
Anyway: I'm not dead! I just sort of burned out on human contact there, I guess. My annual March Malaise must've kicked in a little early this year; February hit me hard, y'all. Just melted me down into a puddle of black ooze that couldn't think or talk or people.
At least last year I had an excuse. (Although, last year, the March vibe was more of a blind, frothing panic; pretty much the exact opposite of malaise.)
So now I get to do a deep dive on my friends list, see what I've missed and possibly -- creepily -- leave comments on some very old entries whilst hoping no one finds this too off-putting. Uh...sorry in advance?
-- I'm starting to think time moves differently for me than it does for everyone else. Slower and...dumber. So much dumber. I mean...Christmas was three months ago? Sounds fake. Sounds super fake. This is my first time posting under the current presidential administration??? Nope. Not accurate. Time, man. [insert terrible Steve Miller Band joke here]
-- I'm not vaccinated yet, but my mom is halfway there, and I'm considering that a triumph. She got all noble on me, said she wanted to wait until I was eligible too and that they could jab both of us or neither of us. To which I said "uh-huh", placed her in an adult-sized baby bjorn and hauled her to the pharmacy myself.
-- (Okay, not really, but only because I have weak lil' T-rex arms and a spine like uncooked spaghetti. In reality, I just hit her with some good, old fashioned, no nonsense eye contact. But it worked, so, again: triumph!)
-- The elevator in my apartment building is out of commission for at least ten weeks while they do repairs and I'm feeling pretty Rapunzel-ish about it. Just, trapped up here, in dire need of a haircut (that second thing is unrelated) and I Don't Like It.
-- Hm? What's that? You say you're in the mood for a horrifying grocery store anecdote? Yep, I've got one. That's the only place I've been in over a year, so I guess I'd damn well better, right?
Okay, picture it. The C-Town, a couple of days ago. It was rainy and chilly, and as you all know, if I get wet I evaporate into a fine mist, so I was dressed accordingly. Big jacket, hood pulled up, lots of dark layers 'cos that's how I roll and, obviously, a huge honking face mask. I cannot stress enough just how little of me was visible. Forehead and fingertips. That's it.
I'm reaching for, I don't know. The milk? When some man -- old enough to be my dad for sure, but not old enough that he can use senility as an excuse -- says, loudly, "Oh, my God, you have the most beautiful eyes I've ever seen!"
And, alright. I'm pretty self-deprecating as a general rule, but I will allow that I have nice eyes. They're very large and very green. People notice them.
But before I can launch into my patented, "thank you so much but also I would prefer it if you didn't look at me" response -- would you believe it? This man I didn't know had even more opinions about the way I look!
"Wow," he went on. "So pretty. So green. You know, when you've got one really great feature like that, just one --" And here he paused to kind of, just, gesture at me, a sweeping, one-armed motion that basically encompassed my entire being from head to toe. "All the other stuff that's wrong with you, all those other things, they just don't even matter. Right?"
Um. WHAT.
He continued! "It's like your beautiful eyes cancel out everything else, like, all of it just fades into the background. Isn't that great? You're so lucky!"
By this point I was fairly certain I was being Punk'd in the dairy aisle. Oh, also, did I mention he was shouting all of this at me from twelve feet away because social distancing?
"I mean, look at me," he said. "I'm nothing special. I'm a mess." And it's true; he looked like a calzone that came to life and, well, decided to spend all its time insulting strange women at the grocery store. "But if I had one great feature like that, just one, I'd have so much confidence! I'd walk around with my head held high! No one could take that away from me -- no one!"
"Okay, bye," I finally said, because it took me 'til then to break out of my frozen stupor. I grabbed my shopping basket and tore out of there, milkless. To hell with the milk.
"They're the windows to the soul, you know!" he yelled after me as I walked away.
And I know my takeaway should've been one of feminist outrage, that I can go out in public with ninety nine percent of me covered up and some man will still find something to rank and objectify. Which, yes, is infuriating. But really I just felt -- well, I did say this was a HORRIFYING anecdote, and...yeah. 'Horror' pretty well covers it.
I burst into tears on the walk home and I've been stuck in this gross funk ever since. I'm not proud of it. It actually almost kills me to admit something so stupid could cut me off at the knees like this. But, oh, it has. It surely has.
And I guess if I can't talk about it here, among friends, where can I, right? So, *jazz hands*
Anyway: I'm not dead! I just sort of burned out on human contact there, I guess. My annual March Malaise must've kicked in a little early this year; February hit me hard, y'all. Just melted me down into a puddle of black ooze that couldn't think or talk or people.
At least last year I had an excuse. (Although, last year, the March vibe was more of a blind, frothing panic; pretty much the exact opposite of malaise.)
So now I get to do a deep dive on my friends list, see what I've missed and possibly -- creepily -- leave comments on some very old entries whilst hoping no one finds this too off-putting. Uh...sorry in advance?
-- I'm starting to think time moves differently for me than it does for everyone else. Slower and...dumber. So much dumber. I mean...Christmas was three months ago? Sounds fake. Sounds super fake. This is my first time posting under the current presidential administration??? Nope. Not accurate. Time, man. [insert terrible Steve Miller Band joke here]
-- I'm not vaccinated yet, but my mom is halfway there, and I'm considering that a triumph. She got all noble on me, said she wanted to wait until I was eligible too and that they could jab both of us or neither of us. To which I said "uh-huh", placed her in an adult-sized baby bjorn and hauled her to the pharmacy myself.
-- (Okay, not really, but only because I have weak lil' T-rex arms and a spine like uncooked spaghetti. In reality, I just hit her with some good, old fashioned, no nonsense eye contact. But it worked, so, again: triumph!)
-- The elevator in my apartment building is out of commission for at least ten weeks while they do repairs and I'm feeling pretty Rapunzel-ish about it. Just, trapped up here, in dire need of a haircut (that second thing is unrelated) and I Don't Like It.
-- Hm? What's that? You say you're in the mood for a horrifying grocery store anecdote? Yep, I've got one. That's the only place I've been in over a year, so I guess I'd damn well better, right?
Okay, picture it. The C-Town, a couple of days ago. It was rainy and chilly, and as you all know, if I get wet I evaporate into a fine mist, so I was dressed accordingly. Big jacket, hood pulled up, lots of dark layers 'cos that's how I roll and, obviously, a huge honking face mask. I cannot stress enough just how little of me was visible. Forehead and fingertips. That's it.
I'm reaching for, I don't know. The milk? When some man -- old enough to be my dad for sure, but not old enough that he can use senility as an excuse -- says, loudly, "Oh, my God, you have the most beautiful eyes I've ever seen!"
And, alright. I'm pretty self-deprecating as a general rule, but I will allow that I have nice eyes. They're very large and very green. People notice them.
But before I can launch into my patented, "thank you so much but also I would prefer it if you didn't look at me" response -- would you believe it? This man I didn't know had even more opinions about the way I look!
"Wow," he went on. "So pretty. So green. You know, when you've got one really great feature like that, just one --" And here he paused to kind of, just, gesture at me, a sweeping, one-armed motion that basically encompassed my entire being from head to toe. "All the other stuff that's wrong with you, all those other things, they just don't even matter. Right?"
Um. WHAT.
He continued! "It's like your beautiful eyes cancel out everything else, like, all of it just fades into the background. Isn't that great? You're so lucky!"
By this point I was fairly certain I was being Punk'd in the dairy aisle. Oh, also, did I mention he was shouting all of this at me from twelve feet away because social distancing?
"I mean, look at me," he said. "I'm nothing special. I'm a mess." And it's true; he looked like a calzone that came to life and, well, decided to spend all its time insulting strange women at the grocery store. "But if I had one great feature like that, just one, I'd have so much confidence! I'd walk around with my head held high! No one could take that away from me -- no one!"
"Okay, bye," I finally said, because it took me 'til then to break out of my frozen stupor. I grabbed my shopping basket and tore out of there, milkless. To hell with the milk.
"They're the windows to the soul, you know!" he yelled after me as I walked away.
And I know my takeaway should've been one of feminist outrage, that I can go out in public with ninety nine percent of me covered up and some man will still find something to rank and objectify. Which, yes, is infuriating. But really I just felt -- well, I did say this was a HORRIFYING anecdote, and...yeah. 'Horror' pretty well covers it.
I burst into tears on the walk home and I've been stuck in this gross funk ever since. I'm not proud of it. It actually almost kills me to admit something so stupid could cut me off at the knees like this. But, oh, it has. It surely has.
And I guess if I can't talk about it here, among friends, where can I, right? So, *jazz hands*
no subject
Date: 2021-03-25 12:39 pm (UTC)FWIW, I don't think it's creepy at all to go back through entries you've missed. Shows you care! Also, I realized you weren't on my lockdown filter, so I've added you to that if you want to go back and see how even so much worse things were for me than what I was saying on the general access locked stuff. 😅
LOLing at your mother's attempt at nobility. OH MOMS.
And BAN MEN oh my god men. BLESSED MISANDRY 5EVAH. Except for my beautiful fictional ones, I am so, so, so done with them. So done. I hate that one of them so drastically undercut your sense of confidence and safety. And it's not stupid or small at all. He verbally accosted you! I wish (for many reasons) that I could give you a big hug. In person.
no subject
Date: 2021-03-30 10:16 am (UTC)Omg, thanks for the filter access! Jeez, for someone who hates missing out on stuff so much, I really did just kind of disappear there for awhile, didn't I? And then I only came back when I had complaints to make. Gaaaah. I'm gonna have to make a real effort not to repeat...whatever this all was.
Fictional men are the only ones I care to acknowledge! And even they disappoint me from time to time. God.
I WANT THAT HUG. <3
no subject
Date: 2021-03-30 12:52 pm (UTC)Aw, bb, whatever. I think it's not a bad idea to approach social media like Marx would recommend, y'know? According to one's ability and need, etc. etc.
And there's definitely a non-zero chance you'll get that hug someday. NYC is my favorite place to visit, so maybe someday...
no subject
Date: 2021-03-25 09:20 pm (UTC)Eek. What floor do you live on?
I don't know if I would ever have the gumption to brain the guy with the nearest frozen object, or to manage a forthright BUGGER OFF in that grocery store situation, and I'm quite certain I would never be able to deliver the eviscerating diatribe I'd want to deliver (and would rehearse, pointlessly, well after the fact). Rest assured you are not alone, we get it, and FUCK THAT GUY. Really, the world would be much improved if the male sex could only be taught to speak when they are spoken to, and not before.
no subject
Date: 2021-03-30 10:26 am (UTC)Oh, God, same. The samest. Clever comebacks are not my thing. Usually I just end up crying, like, well. See above. The guy seemed pretty dim, though, and I think he genuinely thought he was complimenting me, so anything TOO clever would not, not, NOT have registered, I'm convinced.
Male silence. Now that's a concept.
no subject
Date: 2021-03-26 05:35 pm (UTC)Screw that guy, seriously. How dare he talk to you like that? Honestly, I would have slunk out of a situation like that too, even though in my head I wish I'd be all outraged and call him out in person.
But, know right now I'm smiting him big time and am furious on your behalf because you're worth so much more than trash like that.
May he walk barefoot on lego for his whole lifetime.
no subject
Date: 2021-03-30 10:31 am (UTC)I'm okay! I just hate being perceived, is all. (Except, as I keep reminding myself, I really *wasn't* being perceived in any kind of actual way, 'cos like I said -- totally covered up! This person had no freaking clue what I look like, which absolutely adds an extra layer of insanity over the whole mess. Question marks. So many question marks.)
Your Lego visual is bringing me much joy on this bleak Tuesday morn.