Digital Manticore

Being an Athlete

Posted on December 27, 2017 by Lindsey

I am an athlete.

That feels hard to say, but I’ve realized that whether I recognize it or not, it is a fact. Athletes train their bodies. Athletes compete. Athletes adjust their lives to accommodate their athletic goals. I am an athlete.

People have been offering this message to me all year: “You are an athlete.” I’ve shrugged it off, unwilling to reconsider my sense of identity and to carry the responsibility of being An Athlete. I got a massage last month and. The massage therapist reminded me that I am an athelte and should behave accodingly finally got through.

Why resist something so obvious to everyone but me?

I have long thought of myself as a “life of the mind” person. I never liked sports or going outside and being hot and gross. I like reading. I like thinking about stuff. Are these sets of activities mutually exclusive? No. But for me, life has largely been mind over body. Of course, that line of thinking is ruled by the particularly Western notion of dualism. The mind and body aren’t separate entities—the brain is a part of the body, one of the many bits of viscera required to pilot this meat bag through life.

I like lifting weigts and I like playing roller derby, but I still don’t think of myself as someone who likes exercise. I realized it’s because I see myself as a fat person first and an athlete second. Athletes aren’t fat. They aren’t overweight. At least, that’s what years of cultural messages tell me. But it’s not true. Anyone can be an athlete at any size. One of my favorite instagram accounts is that of Olympic weightlifter Sarah Robles. She is a “full-figured” human being, but she got a bronze medal in weightlifting at the last Olympic games. What more proof do I need? What permission am I waiting for to be a chubby badass?

a collage of photos of the author lifting weights and playing roller derby — Portrait of the artist as a fucking athlete

I am starting to treat myself like the athlete I am. Step one was recognizing this for myself, without judgment. I have been living the athlete life in a way already, but mostly focusing on the work and not the care and keeping thereof. My plans in 2018 include eating for my physical needs (that is, eating a lot of healthy protein and vegetables, followed by whatever other food my misguided mind thinks it needs), regular stretching, and more epsom salt baths. I need to rest appropriately and not overtax myself. I’m getting better at listening to my body and learning how to prevent injury (and recently, how to recover from injury). That is what athleticism looks like to me.

personal essay

Empathy for My Teenaged Self

Posted on December 3, 2017 by Lindsey

Memory is a mysterious force. Today I was cooking some cheese-stuffed pasta shells for dinner. It’s a dish I haven’t made as an adult, but one I did eat now and again growing up. I was always glad to get a dinner entree that I genuinely enjoyed, but I was routinely dismayed by the judgment that my dad and step-mom passed on my eating habits. I always wanted to eat more. Sometimes they told me no, others they would say, “Do you really need to have another one?”

Teenage boys are assumed to be constantly hungry. This incessant drive for caloric intake is not frowned upon, as it is in girls, but encouraged. Growing bodies need nutrition, of course. Teenage girls receive another message. The female adolescent body is ever at risk of being fat. As we all know, fat is the worst thing a young woman can be. If you’re fat, men won’t like you and that’s the worst thing of all.

I was always hungry when I was young. Actually, I am always hungry as an adult, but I am learning how better to manage my nutritional needs. A little knowledge and experience can make a huge difference. I’ve been reflecting a lot on diet, eating habits, and how to best eat for my body and level of activity. With these thoughts in mind when this memory of dinners past surfaced, I discovered a new perspective on myself.

I was always hungry because I never had the right food. I never went hungry. We weren’t impoverished and there was always food in the house. However, I lacked the practical knowledge of how to feed myself effectively. Left to my own devices, I’d cook a grilled cheese sandwich or get a pizza. I ate crackers as an after-school snack. Granola bars were a large part of my diet. This might sound obvious, but to me it feels like a revelation to discover that I was always hungry because I didn’t get enough protein or enough of the food I needed to recover from my daily life.

I wasn’t fat. Well, I was overweight but I wasn’t fat in the way we think of fat people, in the loaded sense of the word. But I wasn’t getting what I needed. If you’re told that nearly every food is “bad” for you, then everything becomes equal. Like when every email you get is “urgent,” then there are no urgent issues—it’s all equally important. My step-mom, for example, would see me eating cashews and say “Nuts are fattening.” Well, if nuts are bad and cake is bad, then, why not eat a cake? It all has the same conclusion: food is bad and you’re fat.

There was a year that my step-mom, her daughter, my sister and I lived in the UK. We regularly bought packages of cookies (gotta sample the local cuisine) and we’d all have a cookie or two after dinner. That was great except for when I started to sneak cookies after school when I was the only one yet home. Eventually this escalated to eating multiple cookies. The evidence of my crimes would be unveiled and my step-mom would ask “Who ate all these cookies?” while looking pointedly at me. I was too frozen with shame to respond.

I gained a lot of weight that year (whether it was a lot objectively or not is a question that I cannot answer, but I think I would have fared better if someone had told me it was normal for teenage girls to gain some weight). When we moved back home, my dad made us tacos for dinner. I had keenly missed eating Mexican food so I was excited to eat some homemade tacos. Of course, after eating two tacos and angling for a third I was met with “Are you sure you need another taco?” from my dad. I said I was and then he decided this was the right time to tell me I had gained weight and should stop. Thanks for the support.

From an adult perspective, I question why no one saw this weight gain, saw my eating habits, my emotions, and asked how I felt or if I was hungry or what I needed. Why the fuck would you tell a teenage girl she is fat. Why would you tell your step-daughter that, when returning home from a year abroad, all her friends will see how much she “ballooned out.” I can’t imagine ever saying something like that to anyone, let alone a child. I wish someone had seen what was happening and realized that I needed emotional support instead of judgment and shame.

When you’re fat, you assume it’s because you lack the self-control that thin people have. Or you’re lazy. Maybe you are too stupid to know that you’re supposed to eat right. These are the stories our culture tells us. If you’re fat, it’s your fault. Of course, this narrative ignores the billions that corporations spend to market nutritionally useless foods like breakfast cereal, sugary beverages, and snack cakes. It ignores the hundreds of conflicting diets (low-fat, low-carb, only juice, the tears of one’s enemies) that are backed by little more than the testimony of a thin white woman.

I am fat. I say that without judgment; it’s just a fact of my body. Recognizing some of the factors that have influenced a lifetime’s eating habits is helping me accept myself and accept that it’s possible to live healthfully in my own terms. I know I will never be thin, which is something I am fine with. However, I can be strong, active and confident all while being fat. I can choose what I need to fuel my life. I don’t have to be forever hungry or forever guilty. I can just be myself.

personal essay

Out of Body

Posted on October 23, 2017 by Lindsey

There’s something about choosing an inanimate object as a Halloween costume that simultaneously amuses and unnerves people. When I was a kid I was fond of painting boxes to resemble this or that. One year, a packet of gum, another, a teapot. This year, every person who I have told I plan to be a tree has abruptly burst with laughter. There’s something unexpected about being a thing instead of being a someone. But I struggle to embody someone else when I hardly can embody myself. How can I be someone else when some days, it seems like I am barely myself?

I remember taking a disposable camera with me on a fourth-grade field trip to Sacramento. After developing the roll of film, my parents discovered that the majority of my photos were of squirrels I’d witnessed in and around the capitol. In the eighth grade, when I went to Washington D.C., I used 8 rolls of film taking pictures of monuments, buildings from abstruse angles, and clouds. My parents were mad at the cost of developing all my photos, then puzzled by their contents. “There are no people in these pictures,” my step-mom observed, anguished, “Where are your friends?” Do people have friends in eighth grade? I’m not convinced I did.

Days into my student teaching assignment, my mentor (and now friend) Shannon asked me if I felt like I was observing my life from a distance, like watching a movie of my existence rather than experiencing it firsthand. I narrowed my eyes. Maybe? How would you know to ask something like that? Well, if you know what autism looks like, it’s really not hard to spot in the wild.

My father-in-law is not a man of faith in the typical sense but he has unrelenting faith in the Meyers-Briggs Type Indicator. Your path laid out before you in a four-letter sequence as tidy as your DNA. a-t, c-g, INTJ, ENFP. Destiny. Because my father-in-law and I share a type, INTJ, he believes he knows a lot about me. He doesn’t bother to ask my opinion or hear about my experiences. He knows me like he knows himself. He acts like we’re part of an elite club, leaning in conspiratorially to share a universal truth about the long-suffering life sentence of the INTJ. “You and me,” he begins, “we’re not compassionate. You don’t know how to be a nice person.” One time I said I was, in fact, a pretty alright person and he didn’t know my life, to which he informed me that my response was not indicative of a compassionate person. Apparently, the truly compassionate would have the forbearance and wisdom to take this character assassination in stride and merely smile into the middle distance, secure in the knowledge of themselves.

I want to not be bothered by the stupid shit my father-in-law thinks he knows about me. But when parental figures wade into sensitive subjects it’s difficult to remain steady and trust my sense of self. Why is it a sensitive subject anyway? Why have I spent years thinking I’m some kind of arrogant jerk when, I’m pretty sure, I’m not that at all? Why have I made such efforts to improve my people skills over time? Oh, right, that other father figure: my dad.

My dad has left me with some stupid ideas about myself. Intellectually, I know it’s not true and probably an act of projection, more than one of judgment, but intellectual understanding doesn’t always lead to emotional truth. My dad has said that I’m arrogant, I can’t relate to people. I’m a smart-ass, I’m rude, I’m too loud. But also, that I’m too sensitive, that I’m defensive and collapse under the slightest criticism. It’s taxing, being a living contradiction.

I spent a lot of time in my 20s working on my perceived faults, if they were ever really faults in the first place. Even if my worst traits weren’t as egregious as they were made out to be, I am still glad I was able to improve something about myself. That’s the nature of adulthood: you can choose who to be. I don’t have to be a compassionless jerk if I don’t want to be. So I developed better qualities. I worked on myself. I feel good about the person I am.

Unfortunately, it takes so little to strip me of my sense of self and leave me bare, crying in the bathroom at my in-laws’ house, hoping no one can hear my muffled sobs. My mantra isn’t “I’m good enough, I’m smart enough, and people like me,” but that’s not too far from what I hold onto when I’m hiding in the restroom. It’s too easy to peel back years of self-sufficient, emotionally mature adulthood to reveal the friendless eighth grader taking pictures of clouds on a field trip to Washington.

Ultimately these patriarchal take-downs hurt me because they reveal my fears about myself. I often feel disconnected from myself and others. Maybe I’m even less connected to people than I thought. Maybe my friends aren’t really my friends and everyone is just tolerating me. Maybe I really am just a tree or a teapot, a passenger in my own life.

I know none of those things are true, but sometimes, they feel very real.

personal essay

Me, You, and Everyone Too

Posted on October 17, 2017 by Lindsey

Me, too.

Of course, me, too. I struggle to imagine what sort of woman has never been harassed or assaulted. This theoretical woman would probably be the type to live under some mantle of patrilineal protection: I can only imagine a woman free of harassment if she lives according to the patriarchy’s ever-shifting rules. Even then, is she really free of harassment? If you second-guess yourself into oblivion, contort your whole life to conform to the rules and expectations of the men who surround you, have you really lived a life free of harassment? Or have you merely applied it to yourself, sparing the need for patriarchal sanction?

These discussions surrounding abuse always get me because I have been subject to the leering and dangerous attentions of men, but then I think, well, I’ve never been raped. I’ve never been assaulted. I’ve never not made it home safe. Yet, what I have experienced has stayed with me:

14 and walking home from school, a man pulls his car up to the curb where I’m walking. Two tittering women in the backseat. He invites me in. I can’t remember what he said only that terror overtook me and through the shroud of my naiveté I at least knew to stride purposefully (don’t run, don’t show fear) to my door, lock myself inside.

17 and working a high school job as a caterer. A male patron asks me, “Aren’t you out past your bedtime?” The threat, of course, lurking in the subtext.

19 and working in a mall bookshop. A male customer tells me that it’s cool that I like “reading and stuff.” He follows this statement up with, “How old are you?” and attempts to ask me out.

21 and a man on a bus won’t stop talking to me. He tells me I have a “smile like Malcolm X.” Perhaps this isn’t a true instance of harassment, but it stayed with me. I felt powerless to disengage from this commuter conversation. I still don’t know what about my smile put him in mind of Malcolm X. This mystery lingers.

24 and riding my bike home from work. A man (a youth, more likely) shouts at me from a passing vehicle, “Go eat hamburger, bitch.” Is there truly anything more offensive than a fat woman on a bicycle?

It’s interesting to me that I struggle to recall particular instances of harassment as an adult. Did people stop harassing me? I don’t think so. As I matured and grew confident, shedding my ignorance, I learned how to tell men to leave well enough alone. My male peers started calling me “intimidating.” But something else happened too. I stopped being young. I lost the casual fuckability that men ascribe to young women. I put on weight, shaved my head, became strong. That’s still a woman that men harass, but not the “hey baby” kind of harassment. It’s the “You’re too fat to fuck but I still would and that makes me hate myself and you by extension” brand, which I stopped caring about many years ago.

#MeToo is about sexualized harassment and violence, but I can’t help considering all sex-based oppression. Do I get sexually harassed at work anymore? No. But in my last job, I spent years being seen as some kind of untrustworthy bitch because I refused to do the things women are supposed to do to make men feel comfortable. I am unflinchingly confident. I stopped apologizing for having ideas. I no longer hesitate to correct a man when he talks over me or repeats my suggestions. And you know what? Men fucking hate that. So no, not me too, not lately. Yet, men still hang their expectations on me, and on women everywhere, and behave badly when we refuse to meet them.

Harassment, as #MeToo demonstrates, is not isolated. All women (and some men, sure) experience it. To me though, my experiences seem petty in contrast not only to those of my fellow women, but to those inflicted on us by this system of patriarchal, capitalistic oppression.

Men feel entitled to women. They think they have the right to punish women for not conforming to their “standards” of sexuality. They think they have the right to punish other men for encroaching upon what’s “theirs.”

When I thought about this “me, too” discussion, one of the first things that I recalled was not something that happened to me, per se, but something that happened to my dad.

At eight years old, I witnessed a man smash the side of my dad’s skull with a baseball bat.

My dad had come to retrieve my sister and I from my mom and her boyfriend’s (husband’s? who remembers) house. Some kind of argument ensued. The details I’ve forgotten or perhaps never knew, but can there be any doubt that the nature of this dispute was over who held the rights to my mother?

Dad’s face was covered in blood. We spent the night with my Aunt Ruth and my cousins. I don’t think I understood what was going on but I knew there was a lot of blood involved. My dad lost most of his hearing in one ear.

I know my dad wouldn’t be on team #MeToo, but maybe he should be. This incident wasn’t exactly harassment of me, my sister, or my mom, but it feels like we should think of it that way. What was this other than an act to threaten my mom, to get her in line, to remove a potential suitor and male competitor? Patriarchy is about the violent custody of women as property. Any act to further that system is a part of me, too, in my opinion. So, of course, me too.

language learning

Reading Harry Potter in Spanish

Posted on February 21, 2017 by Lindsey

Canny readers may have noticed a few mentions of Harry Potter on the list of books I read in 2016. Last year, I made it my goal to read the entire Harry Potter series in Spanish. Here I describe why I did it, my methods, and what I got from this exercise.

The Why

Harry Potter is a popular choice for language learners because it’s a popular work generally. It’s translated into a huge number of languages and it’s relatively easy to find. It’s a self-perpetuating cycle of popularity. It also, ostensibly, starts with simple language that gets more difficult throughout each book. I liked the idea of reading something that would build up and having a series that I could focus on. It seemed like it would be easier to start building fluency with a lot of young adult works by one author than with many unconnected books.

Aside from the series’ ubiquity, I chose Harry Potter because I had not read it all. My family was an early adopter of the books. I think we got the first novel when I was, perhaps, 13 (for reference, the last book was published in 2007, when I was 21). My sister was the target age for the story. I was just old enough to still be entertained, but not enthralled. I read through the fifth book (of seven) as an adolescent, but never read the last two. Working the release night of book six at Barnes and Noble resulted in me being fully fed up with the Potter phenomenon. But, nearly 10 years later, I was ready to revisit the story.

The How

I knew that reading Harry Potter in Spanish would be an undertaking in vocabulary. When I started reading it, I was using Anki for flashcards. As I read, I looked up words and wrote down the word and the definition in a steno notebook. This is a method I had used in the past and I liked it well enough. After reading, I added the vocabulary to my Anki flashcard deck.

Sometime in the middle of Harry Potter y el prisoner de Azkaban (book 3), I decided to change it up. Looking up words was making the reading too slow—and I was already reading slower than I wanted (the problem with reading fast in English is that it feels terrible to go so slowly in another language). I decided to try underlining words to look up later, which hadn’t occurred to me until I saw it mentioned in Jhumpa Lahiri’s In Other Words. This was a great choice for me because it made me focus on reading without stopping and on decoding meaning based on context. I don’t think it would have gone well for me to read the first book this way, but it was right by the time I was in the third.

I switched flashcard platforms partway through reading as well. On the recommendation of my Icelandic tutor, I began using Memrise. I decided I liked Memrise better so I made a “Harry Potter Spanish” course and started adding new words. I learned a lot of words this way. Unfortunately, I was taking down more vocabulary than I could learn. My vocabulary study was perpetually eight or more chapters behind my reading. It’s not the worst thing, but it would have been nice to keep pace.

All 7 Harry Potter books stacked — My pile of Harry Potter books

About halfway through Harry Potter y las Reliquias de la Muerte (book 7), I declared lexical bankruptcy. I stopped underlining words to look up later. I hadn’t added any new words to my course since chapter 13 of Harry Potter and the misterio del príncipe (book 6). That said, I had about 2,000 words total in my Memrise course. Plus, I picked up some words and phrases that I didn’t formally study. Although I like learning new vocabulary and there was certainly more I could have learned, I was losing interest in the world of Harry Potter and decided to focus on reading instead of vocabulary for the last leg of the journey.

The Benefits

This seems like a good time for a bulleted list:

I learned a lot of vocabulary words.
I became familiar with a lot of phrases and bits of common usage. For example, you don’t “shake your head” in Spanish, you negas con la cabeza (literally: refuse with the head).
I started reading a lot more smoothly.
I accepted the fact that I do not and cannot know all words (which is also true in English!)
I read a lot faster now.
I can proudly say I read thousands of pages’ worth of writing in Spanish.
I am a much more confident reader.

Now What?

I’ve already started my next book in Spanish, La Distancia Entre Nosotros (The Distance Between Us). It seems much easier to read. In some ways, the subject matter is easier because it’s less fanciful. On the other hand, this is a book written for adults. I’m glad that I read Harry Potter, but I am really glad to be onto another book. My enthusiasm was seriously waning towards the end. In my goals for 2017, I said that I wanted to read 6 books in Spanish this year. At this rate, I’ll be able to get through more than that, which is really cool!

One question I have been asked is whether I would do this again. I am learning Icelandic too and Harry Potter in Icelandic is a real thing. At this point, I am not sure. I definitely got a lot out of reading the series in Spanish, but part of the motivation was also that I had not read all the books before. I might be inclined to read books originally written in Icelandic and that are a little more interesting to me (also good arguments for not reading Harry Potter in Spanish, for that matter). I’m at least a year out from being at a level where I would attempt Harry Potter in Icelandic. I need some time and distance before I could say for sure whether this is something I would do again. For now, I’m enjoying the benefits of being a stronger reader in Spanish.

the world around us

What to Expect When You’re Divesting

Posted on February 13, 2017 by Lindsey

I said in my last post that I would write about divesting from Bank of America. I am here to deliver.

I had never really thought about where my money goes when I put it in the bank. Money is just in the bank, right? I guess I pictured a Scrooge McDuck-ian style vault, or something like you see in a heist movie. I’ve learned that’s not the case at all.

Scrooge McDuck jumping into a pile of gold coins — This is not what a bank is like.

I gradually became aware of the Dakota Access Pipeline issue via Facebook, which seems to be the popular method for obtaining information these days. At first my opinion was “That’s terrible, but it’s not like I can go protest in North Dakota in the middle of winter.” I started paying more attention to the issue and following the Injustice Boycott. I learned that there are actions that I can take other than going to North Dakota. I can divest from banks that fund the pipeline. I was also surprised to learn that Bank of America is invested in private prisons. This is not what my money is for.

Preparation

A week or so before I went to the No DAPL protest, I polled my Facebook network to ask if anyone had a credit union in Sacramento they liked and wanted to recommend. I got a lot of responses. Asking Facebook is, of course, not a replacement for actual research, but if you have well-informed friends I think it’s a good place to start. I got a number of responses including Golden 1 (which I was familiar with), SAFE, and Patel Co, among others. I also learned about the credit union co-op, which links credit unions together. This allows credit union members to use other credit unions’ ATMs. I would not have thought to look that up on my own.

I looked at the sites for a few of the credit unions my friends suggested and decided on Golden 1. For my banking, they seemed to have the best rates. There are also two branches near my apartment, so I knew it would be a convenient choice.

Before heading out, I paid my credit card off and moved all but $25 to my checking. I wrote down how much I had left in my account and put a check in my purse so I could give myself the money. I think there are other ways to do balance transfers, but that seemed the most straightforward to me.

Opening New Accounts

Fresh from the excitement of the protest, I went to Golden 1 on Saturday morning. My boyfriend came along, too. Although he wasn’t ready to switch banks, he wanted to learn more about the accounts they offer. We were also keen to find out more about getting a mortgage. We’re not ready to buy a house, but we are trying to figure out what we could reasonably afford in the near future.

I hadn’t been into a bank to do anything other than deposit or withdraw money in a long time. I went in, wrote my name down on their list for people who want to speak with someone, and waited for maybe 30 minutes. I suppose Saturday mornings are a busy time for the bank.

When my name came up, the bank employee invited us into his office. I told him I wanted to open checking and savings accounts and apply for a credit card (all replacements for accounts I had through Bank of America), and that we were interested in learning more about mortgages. Getting the accounts set up was fairly straighforward, but we were informed that we’d have to talk to a mortgage specialist over the phone and they’re all quite busy on Saturday. I asked that they call me back during the week (they never did call me back. We’re planning to go talk to someone at the bank soon).

To set up the accounts, I only needed to bring a photo ID and, of course, money. They have it set up so you can open a savings account with just one dollar. I had a lot of dollars. I wrote a check to myself (I wrote “Divestment #NoDAPL” in the check memo, just to feel good) and left about $50 in my old account, to cover any direct payments I might have forgotten about. The bank employee had me fill out a few forms and got my checking and savings accounts opened on the spot. I got a debit card that day, but was informed I might not be able to start using it for a few hours. One thing to be careful of if you are changing accounts and moving a large amount of money is that they will probably put a hold on the funds. I got a few thousand dollars within two or three days and the rest of my money dropped in after a week or so. Fortunately, this wasn’t an issue for me, but I recommend that anyone divesting plan accordingly.

I also wanted to open a line of credit to replace my Alaska Airlines Visa, which was managed by Bank of America. I found out that the airline miles I accrued as rewards stay with my mileage plan account, not with my credit card. Even though I was closing the card, I still kept the rewards. It seems like a petty concern, but I have a lot of miles saved up for a trip, so I was quite relieved. The bank employee had me fill out a few forms. I wasn’t able to find out right away how much I would get because a real person had to assess it. However, they figured it out quickly enough. I got a call two hours later to tell me how much credit I’d been approved for.

In total, I spent about an hour in the bank and probably another hour researching and preparing to switch accounts.

Closing Old Accounts

The main thing I wanted to ensure was the continuity of my paychecks. My paycheck is direct deposited into my bank account every other week. The people at Golden 1 said it could take two pay cycles to get my direct deposit set up and provided me with a form to do it. I came home and looked on my company’s employee site. I was able to update my direct deposit account online. I thought it might take two checks to start, but I got paid to my new credit union account the next Friday with no trouble at all.

After my paycheck came through, I went to Bank of America to finish closing my accounts. I run most of my bills through credit cards (and most of them through an account other than the one I was closing). If I depended on my Bank of America accounts, I would have waited a little longer before closing it all up. I only had about $8 left in my checking account.

I spoke to the employee there and told him I wanted to close my accounts. I said that Bank of America is invested in companies that fund private prisons and oil pipelines. He responded, “I can’t argue with that.”

I handed him my debit card, credit card, and ID. He seemed surprised that I wanted to close my credit card too. When I quit, I quit all the way. He had to make a phone call to close the credit account, but he was able to close up my checking and savings accounts through his computer. When he was finished, he took me up to a bank teller, who gave me my $8 and a receipt. This took about 15 minutes total.

Next Steps

It took two weeks to get my new credit card. After it arrived, I made a list of all the bills I pay and set about switching everything to my new accounts. It helped me to write it down, but I still found things I forgot as I worked through it. The good thing is that most places you send money to want to keep getting your money, so they will give you a warning when your card stops working. Now nearly all my bills are getting paid through my new Golden 1 credit card.

I still have an Amazon Visa card through Chase bank. Chase is worth divesting from, but it’s not as dire as divesting from Bank of America or Well’s Fargo. I have decided that, in the interest of maintaining my credit score, I’m going to stop using that credit card, but not close the account right away. Closing a lot of accounts at once can impact your credit score.

Overall, switching banks was fairly simple. I can understand that if you have a car loan or a mortgage, there is probably more involved than there was for me. That said, I think it is important for individual citizens to do what they can to spend money in a way that supports or defunds causes, as appropriate.

Corporations do respond to the pressure of people voting with their wallet. Just last week Nordstrom, among other retailers, announced it would stop carrying Ivanka Trump’s brand. Specific to divesting from DAPL, the City of Seattle and the City of Davis have both voted to remove their cities’ funds from Well’s Fargo. That’s major. Far from being hopeless, the cause is gaining momentum. Two cities have divested. Individuals are divesting. It might take longer than we like for us to stop this oil pipeline and others like it, but it will happen. I am choosing the radical stance of believing that our actions have an impact.

One More Thing

If you’re following the Injustice Boycott and you decide to divest (I hope you do), you can check out their instructions and fill out a survey saying you participated. This helps track the true impact that the boycott is having.

the world around us

What Do We Want? Divestment

Posted on January 28, 2017 by Lindsey

I had never gone to a protest before, until last Saturday. Things being what they are, I went to my second rally in the same week. Yesterday, I went to a “divestment block party” in downtown Sacramento.

I was hesitant to go protest in the middle of the work day. Ultimately, I decided that doing whatever I want in the middle of the day is my prerogative as someone who works from home. I arrived downtown early. Unnecessarily early, but I was nervous. I brought a backpack full of snacks and warm clothes, but I stupidly forgot my wallet. After debating about whether to go home to get it, I paid for parking using the car’s emergency stash of quarters.

I walked around the block to the courtyard in front of the Well’s Fargo building, where the protest was scheduled to take place. I sat on a bench to wait, cold in the tower’s shade. Because I was so nervous about being early and didn’t see anyone else around, I texted the organizer to ask if people had met somewhere else, he told me they would arrive soon. Before the rest of the protesters showed up, a few cops on bicycles rolled in. Several Well’s Fargo employees came outside, joking that the protesters must have already come and gone.

A bike covered in knitting bearing a sign that says "Make America native again." — “If you’re not knitting bike cozies, you’re not paying attention,” one woman quipped to me.

People began to trickle in: two young women, another pair of women toting babies, a handful of professionally dressed people wearing neon green caps proclaiming them impartial legal observers, an old lady with a bicycle covered in knitting. I had never met the protest’s organizer before, but I sensed that the man with a bullhorn and a giant drum must be the guy. He said we would start soon, once the sound system arrived.

In the meantime, the police approached to let us know the rules. The protest organizer was not interested in speaking with the police, but a legal observer jumped in. I edged closer to find out what stance the cops were taking on the event. They told us we were not allowed to enter the bank or block the sidewalk. Because we didn’t have a permit, we were technically not allowed to be there but, the officer generously added, as long as we kept the noise level to a “dull roar,” they would let us stay.

The sound system—an amplifier in a wheelchair, with speakers perched on boards atop the armrests—arrived and the rally started in earnest. Another organizer started us in a round of chants. A woman handed out pieces of paper with lyrics.

Street by street, block by block, Sac stands with Standing Rock.

We got a good bit of a ruckus going, people started chanting louder, some were waving banners and signs with messages like “It’s easier to change banks than to clean water” and “Mni wiconi” (Lokotan for “Water is life.”). Once we were warmed up, an elder of the Lakota Sioux came to speak to us. He prayed in the Lakotan language, which was really interesting for me. He spoke to us about what is happening in Standing Rock, describing the actions there as domestic terrorism. As he talked, a women waved a type of incense around the group, in what I believe was a sort of blessing. Then, a woman of the local Miwok tribe spoke. She told us that native people here are also suffering. She said we need to focus on conserving water and that, after they are done attacking our water supply, the food supply would be next. She encouraged us all to use grey water systems and plant gardens. Then, she taught us a warrior song. Singing the song with the group felt powerful. I don’t know if it was the fact that we learned it from someone who has suffered, or because we were singing it together in a group, but it felt important.

Listening to native people speak about the oil pipeline affected me deeply. I admit that I have maintained a only surface level awareness of the DAPL protests in the last few months, but I had not looked too deeply into it. Maybe I knew that if I did, I would be horrified and I would need to act. You know what they say about ignorance. Hearing directly from native people about their connection to the land and how their lives are being destroyed was impactful. We learn so little about native peoples in school. What we do learn has a museum quality to it. This is what they believed, this is how they lived. But they live and they believe now.

After these speeches, they asked if anyone was ready to divest from Well’s Fargo. Two young women came forward and they were asked to kneel before the group. They bowed as if in prayer. We chanted and sang more. They asked if the women intending to divest wanted to say anything. One did. She held up documents from her new bank. She told us she feels she is a good person and she can’t stand by while her bank funds hate. She was on the verge of tears, and caught in something akin to religious zeal, she encouraged us all to leave our banks in search of banks that use their money to help people.

The women rose and the protesters walked them to the front door of the bank. A news camera sidled along the group. I stayed towards the edge, since my boyfriend begged me not to end up on the news during work hours (“It’s a long lunch,” I’d told him. “Still …” he demurred).

What do we want? Divestment!
When do we want it? Now!

The bank did not allow the women to enter. The police stood in front of the door. “They’re customers! Let them in” People shouted. Bank employees flitted about their fishbowl office. The young women held up their Well’s Fargo bank cards in front of the door. “We’re customers! We are your customers!” Soon a new chant swelled, “Let them in! Let them in!” People surged towards the door. The woman with the “It’s easier to change banks than to clean water” sign shouted at employees visible through the glass.

I saw three men wrench the bank door open from my spot at the back of the group. I had decided the best use of my person was to chant loudly, from the diaphragm, demanding justice. These men had decided their bodies were best used in a demonstration of force. I think at least one of them got arrested because I didn’t see any sign of the organizer after that, only another man toting the drum.

The door open, the bank employees yielded, welcoming the women inside. A cheer went up and a new chant began.

A people united will never be divided!
El pueblo unido jamás será vencido!

The crowd pulled back from the door and reestablished itself in the center of the courtyard. The mood was ebullient. The woman with the microphone asked if anyone had something they would like to say. One native woman asked the elder who had spoken earlier to sing the Native American national anthem. Then the son of another elder took the microphone. He was angry, angry that his dad was in the hospital, angry that the government continued to deny natives their rights. I don’t blame him. If I were protesting an oil pipeline and the government did what they’re doing in Standing Rock, I’d be pretty fucking mad too.

The women emerged from Well’s Fargo after what seemed like an hour. One held her bank reciept aloft. The crowd cheered again. Then, we were directed to march across the street to Bank of America whose funds also go to the DAPL.

You can’t drink oil. Keep it in the soil!

Bank of America is my bank. I’ve had been considering switching banks, but hadn’t yet done more than research. When we reached the bank, they asked, “Who is ready to divest?” I raised my hand and so did one other woman. “Let’s get you inside!” she declared. It was then I remembered my forgotten wallet. “Actually, I don’t have my wallet today. I feel really dumb,” I admitted before the crowd. We sent the other woman in alone and I held her bullhorn for her in a silent apology for my uselessness. Unlike Well’s Fargo, Bank of America gave its customer no trouble, perhaps because we hadn’t been causing trouble at their door for the last two hours. She was in and out in five minutes, announcing “They take your money fast, but they give it back just as quick.”

A building with a long banner reading "Divest No DAPL" hanging from the roof — The DIVEST banner hanging from Well’s Fargo

The march continued. We moved to the sidewalk across from Well’s Fargo. When we approached, we saw that someone had unfurled a banner heralding the cause: “DIVEST No DAPL.” Then the marchers grew truly excited. “We have support on the inside!” they hollered.

I decided that was a good time for me to leave.

This was an interesting experience. I knew it wasn’t going to be anything like the Women’s March, which was huge and had no trouble with the police. I didn’t know what to expect but it was great to feel like I was accomplishing something. I would think that 50 or 75 or however many people showed up does not look like much to a bank like Well’s Fargo, but the people inside sure looked worried. Only three people closed bank accounts that day, but I wonder if anyone else was influenced to take their business elsewhere. Just participating in this processed pushed me from “This is something I’m seriously considering” to “This is something I need to do right now.”

In fact, I’ve already started divesting myself from Bank of America. I’ve been talking to other people about ditching their bank. My sister said she would look at moving her direct deposit to her credit union account. My boyfriend is thinking it over too. These are small changes. I’m one person with less than $10,000 in my accounts. I would like to believe that these small actions are adding up. I went to the protest thanks to a small action. I saw that a friend was interested in going on Facebook and I decided that I should go. That’s why I have decided to write about the experience. I will also write about my experience of getting a new bank account after that is finished.

It seems like so much is happening so quickly right now, but all these current events are the culmination of years of work by right-wing jerks to dismantle what I consider to be civilized society. Let’s all take some small actions and get out of our comfort zones. We’re going to need all the help we can get.

the world around us

Blogging Through the Anger

Posted on January 25, 2017 by Lindsey

I’m not an angry person. At least, I don’t think of myself that way. Some of my family members flare up with white-hot rage, a pyroclasticflow of madness. I’ve always been the even-tempered one, so it is unsual to find myself experiencing rage. I have raged at the news for days. When Trump was elected, I spent some time being sad. Now that I’ve seen how much havoc a small band of oligarchs can wreak in 5 days, I feel fury.

There are many reasons to be mad. However, I can only be so mad at any particular moment. At least, until we unlock more dimensions. I’m sure my eighth-dimensional outrage will be a thing to behold. In the meantime, a tirade in three dimensions.

I saw today, on Facebook, this headline:

Lawmaker: Criminalizing Abortion Would Force Women to be ‘More Personally Responsible’

And I thought, “More personally responsible.” I don’t know if anger can stop time, but I am unable to confirm that time did not stop.

I ask myself: how could women be more personally responsible for childbirth? Actually, here’s what I wrote on Facebook. What I wrote without even reading the article:

Men are the ones who need to be “more responsible” for sex, are you fucking kidding me? Men can LEAVE. A woman is stuck with the responsibility for sex whether she chooses to keep it or not. This is a gods damned joke.

Where are the tragic stories of women deserting their partners? The children who never knew their mothers? The men rushing to the drug store to get Plan B because the condom broke. Oh, wait, those things don’t exist. Women are the primary party responsible for the consequences of sex. Women get pregnant. Women gestate for nine months. Women give birth. Women nurse infants. Women are the primary caregivers. It is woman who is personally responsible for the consequences of sex, not man.

The smug, woman-hating face of Texas State Representative Tony Tinderholt — State Representative Tony Tinderholt. Look at his smug, woman-hating face

Eventually, I read the article. The man making these comments (because obviously only a man would say something so unabashedly ignorant) is, in fact, a state representative in Texas (because obviously Texas). State Representative Tony Tinderholt believes, “that, if passed, the bill would reduce the number of pregnancies, ‘when they know that there’s repercussions .'”

I didn’t know that women were unaware of the reprecussions of sex. Women whose uterine linings shed themselves every month from, for some, as early as the age of 10. Women, one in five of whom are sexually assaulted. Women, who are raped by their own partners. Who could know more intimately of the repercussions of sex.

According to State Representative Tinderholt, it’s currently just too easy to get an abortion. It’s a “backup,” he says. Tony Tinderholt imagines women thinking to themselves, “Oh, I can just go get an abortion.” Sure, just go get an abortion. Walk down to the abortion store and put on my abortion hat and remove this zygote from my body. Truly a simple, painless, and stigma-free process in 2017 America. I do wonder if Tony Tinderholt has ever been with anyone to get an abortion? I bet he thinks he doesn’t know anyone who has had an abortion. I bet he’s wrong about that.

Here are some facts (regular, not “alternative”—or is the alternative to alternative facts “straight edge”? A lot of questions today.):

Women seeking abortion in Texas have to make at least two visits to a clinic. Super convenient for women with jobs. Or women without jobs. For no women, that is, is it convenient.
Women seeking abortion in Texas have to have an ultrasound at least 24 hours before getting an abortion. This is called the “Right to know” law and the medical practitioner is mandated to give out information about “medical risks.”
Women seeking abortion cannot have medication abortion. Even if that might be safer and easier for them.

The worst of all? Texas has the highest maternal mortality rate in the developed world.

Opinions like those of Tony Tinderholt lead to misguided policies to “protect” women from themselves. These policies lead directly to higher mortality rates for women. Women are literally dying because of this smug asshole. Because of a man’s misguided opinion on what is best for women.

An image of women in red with red head scarves taken from the movie The Handmaid's Tale. — Coming soon to a real life near you.

Men like Tony need to admit that these policies are not to protect or help women. They are to control women and their movements. They are to prevent women from having control over their own bodies. That is unacceptable. Women need equal rights to men. We need them now.

A lot of douchebags have crawled out of their holes in the past week, largely in response to the Women’s March. Here are some honorable mentions of people who made me mad.

L.A. Times has put this more succinctly than I can, “An outspoken Nebraska state legislator who was fined for having cybersex using a state computer resigned Wednesday after causing further outrage by sending a tweet that implied participants at the Women’s March were too unattractive to be victims of sexual assault.” Right, because as all women know, only the pretty ones get the dubious honor of being sexually assaulted. Thanks, fella.
Some people are protesting at Planned Parenthood (what else is new) because they want it defunded (I’m not going to link this one). I’m going to give Planned Parenthood some extra money just for them! And I signed up to be a clinic defender. Fuck these people. The matriarchy is strong.
Another gem of a human being from Texas says, in regards to the Women’s March, “Just think about this. After just one day in office, Trump managed to achieve something that no one else has been able to do: he got a million fat women out walking.” Dude, walking was the least strenuous thing I did last week. I’m going to keep lifting weights until I’m strong enough to throw you through a window.
A man who owns a brewery in Sacramento, where I live, said in regards to the Women’s march that “the left just can’t accept loss.” He’s going to have a hard time accepting the loss of business to his brewery.

What I’m trying to say here today is that I’m fucking mad. I’m as mad as I’ve ever been I’m mad that these genuine buttholes feel emboldened by Trump’s election. I’m mad that women still don’t have equal rights, that there’s no equal rights amendment. I’m mad that in 2017 we still have men trying to legislate women’s bodies—not even just trying, succeeding. I’m mad that these assholes have come out of the woodwork.

But you know what I’m happy about? How motivated and strong women are. So many of us have awakened to the fact that it is incumbent upon us all to act. We must act up and we must act out and be loud and be all those stupid things that society tells you you can’t do. Today is the day. Tomorrow is the day too. The next four years are the day because, women, we got this. The matriarchy is strong and its roots are deep.

the world around us

2017: What Am I Doing?

Posted on January 1, 2017 by Lindsey

It turns out that I blogged not at all this year. I was too busy doing everything else. Even though everyone around me was asking “Is 2016 the worst year ever?” I, personally, had a really good year. I got a promotion at work and then got a new job after that, which is remote and pays a lot more. I played a lot of roller derby and I made a lot of progress in my studies.

Languages

I said last year I was trying to write more in both Spanish and Icelandic. I did some writing in Spanish, but not much. In Icelandic, I did a moderate amount, mostly guided by my tutor.

This year I’m going to keep working with my Icelandic tutor. I started taking lessons in May and it’s helped me immensely. I reached a point with my studying in the spring when I decided I just wasn’t able to work the language out without direction and feedback. In addition to taking lessons, my goals is to read one book in Icelandic. I bought a short, young adult novel a few months ago. It seems like something I can reasonably read.

I wanted to get through the Harry Potter series in Spanish this year. I got close. I’m about 100 pages into the last book now. I spent a lot of time reading and learning vocabulary from what I read. I didn’t do much more than that, but I think it was a good use of my time. I’m reading much more fluently than when I started and I’ve learned a lot of vocabulary. This year, I’m going to keep reading (I already have a little stack of books in Spanish to read next), but I also want to focus on language production. I intend to write more, definitely. It’s easy to find people to look over Spanish writing. I also want to find a tutor. I think the targeted practice and feedback will make a difference as I push towards fluency.

The other thing I started doing this year that helped immensely was keeping language notebooks. In the past, I had notebooks full of words, but this year I tried something new. Each week, I write down what my goals are for the language. On the facing page, I write down new vocabulary, grammar notes, or other things I learn. This helps me stay focused week to week and gives me a record of what I have done.

Derby and Fitness

Derby was a big part of my life this year, both on and off the track. I took on some jobs with our league and I started announcing at bouts! I was hoping to make the Bruisers this year, but that didn’t happen. In the last quarter of 2016, I did make our new C team, however, and I got to play my first bout. I am a much stronger skater and player than I was a year ago, so I feel confident that I’ll make the B team this year.

My fitness/derby goals for the year:

Build endurance, particularly on skates but also off.
Improve my agility especially in regards to quick footwork and lateral movement.
Announce at WFTDA playoffs.
Make fitness an everyday habit. I’ve started doing this since I’ve been working from home the last two weeks, but I want to make sure I’m building exercise into my day, not just focusing on going to the gym as exercise.

Everything Else

I have a lot of other goals. There are so many things I want to do.

Cooking: I am going to try two new recipes per month. I have some new cookbooks and I have been thinking about expanding and making some different foods. This will be fun for me.
Reading: Read at least 52 books and work through the backlog of books that I have (i.e., don’t buy so many books until I read what I’ve already got). I also want to read at least 6 books in Spanish this year and 1 in Icelandic.
Hiking and camping: My boyfriend and I got an America the Beautiful pass for Christmas. We made a point of going hiking more often last year, but this year I want to do more, especially since we have the pass. We also got a camping stove so I am looking forward to more camping and cooking.
Staying informed and active: I started paying for news and sharing things people can do to be politically active. This year my goal is to take political action (calling representatives, writing letters, etc) at least weekly and read some news every day so I know what is going on.
Relaxing: I am not always great at stopping what I’m doing and letting myself rest. I have so much I want to do that it seems like relaxation doesn’t help, but of course it

Here’s to 2017!

Date Finished	Title	Author
01/02/17	Shattered Pillars	Elizabeth Bear
01/19/17	Lies Incorporated: The World of Post-Truth Politics	Arti Rabin-Havt
01/27/17	Bad News: Last Journalists in a Dictatorship	Anjan Sundaram
02/03/17	Strangers in Their Own Land: Anger and Mourning on the American Right	Arlie Russell Hochschild
02/09/17	The Stars Are Legion	Kameron Huley
02/13/17	Harry Potter y las reliquias de la muerte	J. K. Rowling
02/16/17	Hope in the Dark: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities	Rebecca Solnit
02/27/17	Crossroads of Canopy	Thoraiya Dyer
03/12/17	La distancia entre nosotros	Reyna Grande
03/15/17	Black Against Empire: The History and Politics of the Black Panther Party	Joshua Bloom and Waldo E. Martin
03/27/17	Ascension	Jacqueline Koyanagi
04/11/17	White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide	Carol Anderson
04/14/17	Another Day in the Death of America: A Chronicle of Ten Short Lives	Gary Younge
04/17/17	The Djinn Falls in Love and Other Stories	Jared Shurin, Mahvesh Murad
04/20/17	Dark Orbit	Carolyn Ives Gilman
04/21/17	Men Explain Things to Me	Rebecca Solnit
04/27/17	Halfway Human	Carolyn Ives Gilman
04/29/17	Arkfall	Carolyn Ives Gilman
05/01/17	The Ice Owl	Carolyn Ives Gilman
05/14/17	Too Like the Lightning	Ada Palmer
05/20/17	Seven Surrenders	Ada Palmer
05/22/17	The Geek Feminist Revolution	Kameron Huley
05/24/17	Shipley Proposal Guide	Larry Newman
05/28/17	El Mañana: Memorias de un éxodo cubano	Mirta Ojito
05/31/17	Ammonite	Nicola Griffith
06/09/17	Leviathan Wakes	James S. A. Corey
06/20/17	The End of Men and the Rise of Women	Hanna Rosin
06/30/17	A Field Guide to Getting Lost	Rebecca Solnit
07/02/17	Double Bind: Women on Ambition	Robin Romm
07/10/17	Inferior: How Science Got Women Wrong — and the New Research that’s Rewriting the Story	Angela Saini
07/15/17	Todas las hadas del reino	Laura Gallego
07/18/17	A Conjuring of Light	V. E. Schwab
07/19/17	The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America	Richard Rothstein
07/31/17	The Refrigerator Monologues	Catherynne Valente
08/02/17	History of Wolves: A Novel	Emily Fridlund
08/07/17	Knitlandia: A Knitter Sees the World	Clara Parkes
08/17/17	The Bear and the Nightingale	Katherine Arden
08/18/17	Things We Lost in the Fire	Mariana Enriquez
08/22/17	The Stone Sky	N. K, Jemisin
09/10/17	The Radium Girls	Kate Moore
09/11/17	Ninefox Gambit	Yoon Ha Lee
09/15/17	Passing Strange	Ellen Klages
09/19/17	Trainwreck: The women we love to hate, mock, and fear … and why	Sady Doyle
09/21/17	Hunger	Roxane Gay
09/27/17	Last First Snow	Max Gladstone
10/01/17	We Were Feminists Once: From Riot Grrrl to Cover Girl, the Buying and Selling of a Political Movement	Andi Zeisler
10/06/17	Two Serpents Rise	Max Gladstone
10/13/17	Iraq + 100: The First Anthology of Science Fiction to Have Emerged from Iraq	Hassan Blasim
10/17/17	The Mothers	Brit Bennett
10/24/17	Nasty Women: Feminism, Resistance, and Revolution in Trump’s America	Samhita Mukhopadhyay
10/31/17	Three Parts Dead	Max Gladstone
11/03/17	What Happened	Hillary Clinton
11/08/17	Deep Survival	Laurence Gonzales
11/13/17	Pro: Reclaiming Abortion Rights	Katha Pollitt
11/19/17	Why Bad Governments Happen to Good People	Danny Katch
11/22/17	Four Roads Cross	Max Gladstone
11/25/17	An Excess Male	Maggie Shen King
12/03/17	How Emotions Are Made	Lisa Feldman Barrett
12/15	The Cooking Gene	Michael Twitty
12/18	Sing, Unburied, Sing	Jesamyn Ward
12/27	Full Fathom Five	Max Gladstone
12/27	Her Body and Other Parties	Carmen Maria Machado