Saturday, March 31, 2012

The Idiot Girls' Action Adventure Club


The Idiot Girls’ Action-Adventure Club: True Tales from a Magnificent and Clumsy Life  by Laurie Notaro
2002
Weight:  6.4 oz
Method of Disposal: Donating



A phenomenal person was born on this day years ago.  We celebrated and not in the style of Laurie Notaro, whose stories are more likely to resemble random moments in my life than in Tracy’s (the phenomaenal person).  Regardless of that disparity, I decided to get rid of this book today in the interest of parties, partying, and the overall good times.

I met T four years ago, and I have been amazed ever since then.  There are few people who understand me better than her and there are even fewer people that I could spend so much time with and still enjoy life.  She encourages, inspires, and teaches me.  She is hilarious, redunkulous, and essential.  This is my shout out.  Happy Birthday, Tracy!  Love you!

As for Notaro, if you are interested in reading about drunken adventures and the times when life goes awry—the things most people do not admit—you may be interested in reading this book.  Let me know.  You have until this upcoming Friday to claim this book as your own.  Otherwise, it is off to the donation bin.

Thursday, March 22, 2012

Alone

The Collected Poems  by Sylvia Plath
1992
Weight: 12.8 oz
Method of Disposal: Donation



This loneliness is heavy.  Keep me in the bed, wide awake, heavy.  It is searching and unimpressed.  I have always loved and clung to my independence with full-on claws, but I just want to fall asleep with someone’s arms around me right now.  I want to have that trust that you develop with a person where you do not even have to cry and they know you are falling apart.  They know to just be there.  The older I get the less I feel I can find that.  Each month, I build a new wall.  I develop a new personality quirk or reason to distrust.  The list of my attractive qualities goes into decline at an alarming rate.  I am left with a quiet desperation. A finely tuned pathetic persona.

I have amazing friends, for days, so I can distract myself until it gets late.  Wrap myself up in their comfort and compassion, but it is at night, when I am agonizing, that I feel Alone.  Or it is this particular night. 

Are you claustrophobic?

On Another Note:

At work, if they cut into a dog and find cancer they have to see how far it has spread, where will it spread, and how fast.  What is the quality of life?  You make a decision before the animal ever wakes up about whether or not to euthanize.  What is more humane?  What the fuck is humane?

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Overwrought and Overcysted

The Journals of Sylvia Plath  Foreward by Ted Hughes 1998
White Oleander  by Janet Fitch 1999  *Complete with a bird feather I found over ten years ago*
Weight: 2 lbs
Method of Disposal: Leaving Somewhere



I am fully prepared to be more dramatic than necessary.  That is why I chose Plath and Fitch to get rid of.  I am sure I need not explain.  

There is one word I would use to describe myself over the last couple weeks: Overwrought. 

And on a completely separate note, I may have another word--cyst-riddled.  

I got my ultrasound results early this month and they proved what the doctors and I have known for over a decade.  I have ovarian cysts.  Very normal.  I have at least 8 on my right ovary, 4 on my left, and one in my cervix.  I am taking Provera to regulate my periods.  The usual stuff.

Today, I saw my doctor because in between Thursday and Sunday I developed multiple lumps on my skull and neck.  Gross, yes.  My lumps, my lumps, my lovely lady humps.  Not what the singer had in mind, but that song comes to the fore as soon as I speak aloud about all these bumps and so here we are.  She seemed to disagree with the ones on my neck about as much as I disagreed with all of them being anywhere.  She whisked out of the room, speaking of scheduling a biopsy.  Then, on second thought, decided to do an MRI first.  Yes, please.  Let us take a little looksee before you carve into MY NECK.  Not my leg, back, or belly, but my neck, with all of its major bloodlines.  I might have grown a little queasy, even though I am a badass and would never admit it.

She decided it was time to visit the hematologist and so I am off to the cancer center.  I know all the logical things that people tell you to know in these moments.  She just wants to rule it out.  The machines are better.  You don’t have a family history.  It may just be a strange showing of lymph nodes, maybe it is the tattoo, or the herbs.  I know I know.  I no longer get the “you are too young.”  I miss those days.  I hate growing older.  I hate the idea of disintegration and death.  It is hard to not think about these things when you are handed a card with the word “cancer” on it.  I am not trying to proclaim my own death or seek out sympathy.  I am not terrified, but I am a little uneasy.  I might have felt tears come to my eyes while I was driving, even though I am a badass and would never admit it.

I have never had an MRI before.  I know they make some people nervous.  I do not think they will make me nervous, but I don’t know.  Should I be?  So many people I know get regular MRIs so I vote “no.”  Or is this nervous?  The people I know have serious medical conditions and/or moments.  Why should it be any different for me?  Because I said so.  This will not become a serious thing because I said so.  That is why.
I so often feel like a five to sixteen year old still.  I get smitten and silly.  I get self-conscious and self-deprecating.  I am not prepared to face my own mortality in any real way.  I am not mentally at the age of my physical body.  

That’s not even true.  The truth comes next week.  We will probably never know whether I have mettle or not  because the chances of these things not being serious are great, and I know I know, before you tell me, I will focus on that and not panic.

Friday, March 9, 2012

International Women's Day


Abortion Without Apology: A Radical History for the 1990s  by Ninia Baehr 1990
Homegrown: Engaged Culutral Criticism  by Bell Hooks and Amalia Mesa-Bains 2006
Slut: Growing Up Female With a Bad Reputation  by Leora Tanenbaum  2000
Zenzele: A Letter for My Daughter  by J. Nozipo Maraire  1997
Weight: 2 lbs
Method of Disposal: Leaving somewhere



The books that fall into the loose category of “Women’s Studies” are absolutely the most difficult for me to let go.  I usually ignore them when I am trying to pick out which book I will get rid of next.  I figure I have months, years before I have to go there.  Yesterday was International Women’s Day, so in honor of that I have decided to a let a few go.

ZenZele is written by an incredibly brilliant woman who has lived all over the world.  She was born in Zimbabwe and has studied at Harvard, Columbia, and Yale.  She is a doctor and studied neurology.  She is married with children.  She wrote ZenZele, which went on to be published in numerous languages and won all sorts of awards.  This is the kind of person that makes you look back on your own life timeline and then question how you could possibly waste so much time!  Apparently, there was so much more than you noticed.

Leora Tanenbaum’s record is nothing to scoff at.  She has written multiple books, articles, and blog entries.  As a self-identified Slut, I could not help but pick up this book all those years ago when it came out.
I will read anything by Bell Hooks and was excited to get to know Amalia Mesa-Bains.  I do not guess I need to keep going through each author’s credentials.  They are all amazing.  Homegrown is about creating “cross-cultural and cross-issue coalitions” in the face of the polarizing media, amongst other things.

Abortion Without Aplogy gives a brief and bold history of the abortion rights movement, complete with interesting and blunt illustrations, political cartoons, and activist art.

Please let me know if you would like any of these books.  I will not release them right away.  Also, let me know if you did anything for International Women’s Day. 

Monday, March 5, 2012

The Only Bush I Trust Is My Own

The Only Bush I Trust Is My Own
2005
Weight: 3.2 oz
Method of Disposal: Leaving somewhere



A college professor convinced me to buy this book.  She knew the author and thought it was great.  I am embarrassed to admit that I had one of those "good bush/bad bush" shirts with the outline of a woman's crotch presented next to an outline of the former President Bush (still makes me shudder to say those words together).  The title of this book followed in that vein.  I loved that professor.  I hated Bush.  Why not?

It was alright.  I really did not feel much about it.  I might have built it up to much after receiving the recommendation, but I remember wishing it would have been something else.  Something better.  None the less, it was fun enough and read quickly. 

Sunday, March 4, 2012

271 Books, 298.6 LBS

Rolling Stone: Images of Rock and Roll
4.8 lbs
1995
Method of Disposal: Donating


The Rock and Roll book is in great condition.  Just in case you want it.

I am almost 300 lbs lighter!