hope your Saturday is spoiled like we spoil dogs in our family . . .

do you have your daughter's bail . . .

November 12, 2004 - a dark day among months of dark days for me – and for my daddy because he loves me.  Hard for him watching a grown kid learning to walk – I’ve got two of my own growing, growing, growing – guess we’re growing ‘til we’re not.   I'm blessed to have my father here and safe hands to hold me steady.

He took me to see Bette Midler in Oklahoma City.  He said I needed it.

I did.

I felt a reprieve had been granted once we got into the arena – dark, big, full of strangers - and took our seats.  I love Bette Midler. love.her. – In any event, my easier breathing was short lived as two drunken bitches behind us a) kept kicking my seat, b) sang at the tops of their lungs (and not well) and c) sloshed their nasty 3.2 domestic arena beer down my back.

If you’ve ever been in a very bad way, you know the feeling of “wtf else?” – the feeling you exist purely for the Devil’s sinister amusement, the feeling your skin has evaporated into little more than scales on a butterfly’s wings.

can’t.even.see.a.concert.with.my.dad.

I turned…nicely….. “please, do you mind – just a little more careful, ladies . . .”

The big one, “turn the fuck around, bitch.”

 . . . “just here with my dad, trying to enjoy the show . . . please . . .”

The little one, “ . . . who’s going to make us, you?”

At which point, Daddy turned politely:

“oh, I assure you, she can  – and most importantly, I’ve got her bail – in any amount set when she’s finished, depending.”

They left.  He held my hand in his safe hands and we listened to Bette. 

embracing your hysteria and trying not to vomit a little in your mouth . . .

I’ve been called “hysterical” – and if you’re female – trust me, so have you. 

The “H” word is usually tossed during confrontations when a girl’s intellect is fully revealed and semi-witty responses to her proper arguments have been exhausted or concession ignorantly and/or stubbornly refused by her opponent.  “H” bombing starts early.  Most girls have been on the receiving end of a confused look and dropped chin by the time they’re in sixth grade – accompanied by the ever telling head shake.  To be labeled “hysterical” by citizens of influence  is still the best and most effective cheap shot in undermining a woman’s credibility, confidence and position.  “Hysteria” remains the slant of a biased media when reporting on strong, opinionated political women. It is the easiest dismissal of all time.  Nothing makes a girl crazier than being called "hysterical."

“Hysteria” is not a charge leveled at men because they don’t have the parts for it.

Plato wrote the matrix of women i.e. the womb - becomes a wandering thing when the organ remains empty beyond its proper time - becoming “discontented and angry,” it dries up, shrivels ups, breaks loose from its tethering and begins traveling about the body in an upward direction – interfering with breathing and circulatory function – driving the woman so afflicted to every extremity, causing every kind of disease – including strangulation if reaching the chest - until such time as it has been sown and rendered again content and docile.  This “animal that longs to generate children” if not “constantly irrigated” by males (yes- “irrigated”) and anchored by pregnancy causes the sufferer the most extreme anguish and oddest behavior. Aristotle believed women were defects of nature – but did concede their singular defect (not being male) rendered them capable of child bearing – presumably to some benefit of the human race.

Hippocrates and his followers perpetuated the wandering womb theory in medicine – “hysteria” as a condition particular to women resulting from uterine dysfunction i.e. remaining un-pregnant for too long. The father of medicine himself coined the term believing suffocation and madness were the fate of women whose uteri experienced drought due to a lack of regular irrigation.

The Greek word for “uterus” is “hystera.”

** pause for "wtf " moment**

On through the ages to Charcot and his student Sigmund Freud – and their sex, sex, and more sex and hysteria studies. Freud - quitting the work he had hoped would make him famous – the search for the ever elusive eel penis - admitted failure in his first published paper (he never found the eel’s penis) and in complete frustration turned to the study of women and hysteria – and cocaine. Girl crazy was an extremely lucrative business early on and in 1918 Sears, Roebuck and Co. advertised the sale of the home “massaging device” so that women could treat their own hysteria economically and in the privacy of their own homes. This “home essential” was on the market nine years before the electric vacuum and ten years before the iron.

The stresses of the modern women, after all - caused them to lose all civility and subjected them to nervous disorders and problems with their reproductive tracts. On and on through the ages, friends.  Thank heaven, men are still around to offer medical assistance by way of, “I know what you need.”

Hell yes - that’s got to be it.

I wonder what the cure for dumbass is . . .

getting in the mood. t'was a great Halloween :)