Germophobe, Not Homophobe

"Germophobe, not homophobe," said the old man with the cane to the old man with the walker.

They passed us as I smoked cigarettes on the steps of K & D's place. "He won't go bowling. He won't put his feet in shoes that other people wear."

"I would never put my feet in shoes that just anyone can wear," the other one said as they hobbled by, shouting.

D was ready to follow them with a recorder. K had missed the germophobe, not homophobe comment and didn't get why we were laughing so hard.

I was there to rage and smoke D's cigarettes. I was furious about a literary event at the Brooklyn Public Library and had heard a dialogue I wasn't expecting to hear. Two women. One young and in awe, her hair all over her face so that no one could see her. The other old with stark white hair pulled off of her face, a hot older writer. Ruddy complexion and solid build.

The conversation went something like:

"Why do you write?" "Where do you write?" "Your life has been hard."

It sucked and I wanted to leave. I got my excuse to book it very early on.

Moderator with hair all over her face: "Blah, blah, blah are you a feminist?"'

Novelist woman who lives in exile from her native country but refuses to identify as an exile because the people are too nice: "I am not a feminist, I am a humanist. I do not think women should be involved in all spheres of participatory life, it is the men who should be involved with politics. A woman's real role is motherhood."

I didn't wait for her definition of motherhood and bounced.

The lesbian who walked out of the limited and narrow atmosphere into a chilly spring night.

It was the second night in a row that my bubble was infiltrated by my rotting idealistic crutch (see "Confronting a Limited Idealism," April 29 blog); like I'm just walking along and the crutch falls apart and I slip and something dirty gets inside my bubble.

Yesterday was imperialistic status quos.
Today was women going back to the home.

Maybe it strikes me so hard to get inside and filibuster my sanctum because I do just want a bourgeois life in a safe country on a nice block telling children stories. Let the men, whoever they may be, play at politics.

I am not a man. I am a woman who wants to be in the kitchen.

There is this woman I met a few months ago who startled me so deeply I cannot shake her, however much I'd like to. She entered my home, the most sacred of my landscapes, called me a fat boy and left.

I went on a juice fast for two weeks - kind of, I've never been good with either discipline or not eating but I did lose winter with an iron deficiency pounds pretty quickly. I suffered from this plaguing identity crisis. I, who have never done labels, have allowed myself to become boi-ed by the "community." I am not a boy and I am not a boi. I am a woman.

I sent her an angry text.

She called me.

Put me on speaker phone to a room full of parrots without my knowing.

 She called the writer a gypsy and wondered why I cared so much. I spoke about my bubble. She thought I was PMS. I told her I'd just spent the past few days bleeding everywhere.

I am a lunatic who lives in a bubble so I can go out and play with anyone I like. It is when my safe spaces are desecrated that I become intolerant.

I am outraged, I said to everyone who would listen.

Drinking a beer in a bar with this writer speaking her truth that I do not want to believe, I would kiss her ancient mouth, that has seen more than my Brooklyn bubbled ass getting tighter by the day will ever see, that keeps her secrets hers.

It is my own escapist tactics that failed and I was angry. I was angry yesterday when free speech was dismissed by the male upper echelons of this fantastic humanitarian organization as I was angry today when free speech was allowed through the voice of a controversial woman novelist from somewhere else.

I took my dog and went to K & D's to demand a conversation. They are serious people and they take me and my serious seriousness quite seriously, which I find funny.

We ranted on the steps and two old men passed by. Germophobe, not homophobe, the one with the cane said to the one with the walker.