Provocative Victim

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I actually heard that at work the other day,  from a man at the lunch table.

Yes, I don’t quite believe it! Apparently the phrase has currency . I was told it means a victim who provokes a bully to bully them.

I don’t think this should be so. How can these two powerful words be placed beside each other?

By now I thought we’d woken up in the #Me too, world and learnt that victims don’t ask for abuse, they don’t provoke, they are not responsible for another’s rage, jealousy, contempt and callous words. Rather a bully lacks control and blames others for their response and never owns their responsibility.

Too often, I hear,

“But they deserved it…”

the Collins Dictionary defines provocative as an adjective, that

“if you describe something as provocative, you mean that it is intended to make people react angrily or argue against it.”

and as an adverb, if you describe” someone’s clothing or behaviour as provocative, you mean that it is intended to make someone feel sexual desire.”

Hmm, and The Oxford English Dictionary describes the meaning of victim

as a noun;

  1. A person harmed or injured or killed as a result of a crime, accident or other event or action.
  2. A person who is tricked or duped
  3. a person who has come to feel helpless and passive in the face of misfortune or ill-treatment.

And so my friends, a Provocative victim simply cannot exist because to be provocative (means to intend to cause a reaction)and a victim ( a person who is injured or feeling helpless in the face of misfortune) does not purposely set out to cause themselves injury or pain. How could they?

It is alarming to hear this phrase being given any sort of currency because the last thing a victim needs to be is held accountable for the failure of a bully to control themselves. That’s a bully likely to blame others – likely the victim for the bully’s behaviour. A bully needs to take responsibility. they need to take responsibility and regulate their responses to others, rather than seek fault and blame in the victim.

Stop victim blaming!

So often I hear people speak so casually of victims,

“Oh she talks too much”

“Why did she wear that?”

“Why did she walk home alone?”

Why?

Her choice, No provocation intended, it wasn’t for you!

 

 

 

High Maintenance

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Timing is everything.

In the past I think I was just a little off the beat.

It is amazing to find myself finally in step with another and feeling the world isn’t spinning so fast, that in fact things don’t have to be tough.

Sometimes, my friends, I haven’t listened to my senses.

I remember the smell that made me recoil, the joy that couldn’t be forced or made up. Rather, feeling unworthy I had not heard the messages my body was constantly sending me.

Instead I let others tell me how I felt or should feel because I doubted myself, I demanded little and that was the first time I heard the phrase “high maintenance woman”. I was told that was It was good I didn’t need much because that meant I wasn’t a high maintenance woman. Apparently I could and should be happy cooking dinner alone, bedtime routines each evening with the children solo and with toadstools growing in the bathroom and then gifts picked out for me to be thankful for. Eventually I grew resentful of the little space in my mind and my body for myself and when I asked for more, I was accused of being selfish and becoming a high maintenance woman.

I was tired of my cage.

When my new love referred in an off-hand way to high maintenance women, he felt the full onslaught of my past, and my previous understanding of a high maintenance woman, as defined by my past as a disrupter a woman who was disagreeable who demanded her own time and a nice house and equality. I let forth with an avalanche of,

” Why can’t I be high maintenance?”, He looked confused.

It turns out that he had a different definition, his was of a woman who was so self involved that she couldn’t look out and give. I explained what the past had defined as high maintenance.

He was surprised and when he googled high maintenance was as shocked as me to find whole misogynistic sites devoted to the definition I had known, including tips for guys on how to manage a high maintenance woman! I mean have you have ever heard a man referred to as high maintenance? We agreed it was horrible and his definition didn’t refer to the popular definition of the typical high maintenance woman,

 (She)  “Has higher than normal expectations; has a greater requirement for affection or attention; has more needs and/or demands and therefore more difficult or challenging. doesn’t equate to money or material possessions alone but may be needy in emotional attention and affection; picky, bratty, likes things her way, takes pride in her appearance, finicky. Usually very well put together and usually independent therefore requiring a lot of a man to keep up with her”

“If you have to reassure her through texts email or calls that you’re lucky to have her, she’s so pretty, etc..-she’s a high maintenance woman”.. from urban dictionary 

Try reading that again and see if you could say that about a man without a backlash!?

I am learning that different people understand ideas in different ways.

Now I feel sure of my heart.

This new song has a beat, closer to my own,  I can tune into it, it tells me that things can be easy, it’s worth knowing that love doesn’t cost a thing. It can be freely given, there is no expectation of a debt, love is not high maintenance it is respect and care and kindnesses, it is not a competition. A gentle waltz or a gorgeous salsa; its rhythms allowing for reciprocal kindness.

Aside

Happiness and protocols on a Saturday night

Lately I have noticed there are those that would rather wallow in misery than allow joy and fun into their lives. The funniest part is those that have a serious case of the glums have been younger than me!

The most recent encounter was on a trip away with my beloved to a little seaside town. The quaint town charmed, with its fisherman’s houses and boutique distillery/gift shop outlets and the imposing bluff above the town.

The drive into the dark the previous night had been worth it to wake to such a beautiful place. It was lovely to sit on the balcony with a hot cup of tea and watch the morning awaken.

Later after tackling a hearty brunch in a café with a whale’s name, we even surprised ourselves and surmounted the monolithic bluff that sat above the town. The day had been abnormally hot and so we decided to relax on the balcony and watch the other climbers and the world go by.

Then as we sipped champagne, enjoyed our antipasto platter and continued our banter and laughter the storm broke. It was a relief to have the thunderstorm bring the rain, it swept away the pesky flies and the heat but it also made the power go out.

It made no difference to us, two mid forty-year olds; we continued our banter and I may have laughed – a lot!

The woman from the other room (that shared the balcony) sat on a couch (that her boyfriend had pointedly turned to face the other way in the early afternoon) on the balcony on her own. She was dressed for dinner, but with the lights and power out, there was nowhere to go. Her boyfriend returned briefly and  sat for a moment bedside her, before both retreated to their room, loudly slamming their door.

I wonder if perhaps they had been unprepared to share the balcony with others? We were not averse to saying hello.

Then out of nowhere the woman from next door – still dressed for dinner – appeared tentatively, on her own, shoulders tight, and said as our laughter was still ringing,

“Could you just tone it down, please? We’re trying to sleep..”

Fortunately being agreeable types we acquiesced and went back into our stuffy room. It was then that I showed the time to my partner – the time on my phone said 9:35 pm, on a Saturday night!

9:30! Perhaps the thirty year olds with a serious case of the glums couldn’t cope with the sight of forty-year olds having fun, inhabiting joy. Despite the weather sharing happiness!

Who knows, if they had said hello we would have invited them over to join us. It was disappointing and hilarious at the same time, to be asked to tone it down by a thirty year old at 9:35pm on a Saturday night. Don’t worry dear reader, it didn’t dampen our spirits, rather added to our adventure.

We all I think deserve happiness. It came as somewhat of a revelation, when someone dear said that to me recently. I realised that in fact for the longest time I just expected that I didn’t deserve it and didn’t expect to have happiness.

But we all do, including those glum thirty year olds, who told us to tone it down!

Happiness is a right, not a privilege. It’s not luck, cut yourself a big , guilt-free slice, you deserve it!

 

 

 

Image

Willpower!

Let me start friends by stating that I am aware that being body positive and having a better relationship with food is really a first world problem. I know that there are many around the world who need a clean and reliable source of drinking water. So I am prefacing this blog by acknowledging that the following ramble contains observations of self perception, made from my privileged first world existence.

This world is largely driven by consuming advertising bundled up with sex appeal. The premise is that you could be better if only you: put this on, owned this, wore this, bought this and in fact was this other, that is anything other than you.

It creeps into our everyday, mothers, to daughters, fathers to sons.

For myself, I couldn’t say that my relationship with food has ever been good. Then throw the festive season in on top of that and it becomes especially challenging.

I try not to over complicate food, and just have it as it comes.

I can say that it has been confronting to have a mother who has been smaller than me, most of my life, but it is what it is.

I wonder if others have less than helpful self talk like I do? You know, on any given day I can look in the mirror and see a different me,

Today too big

Yesterday too tired

Some days just right, where does this self loathing come from?

Quite possibly we internalize the things that are other, that we think should make us desirable. The other perfect slender self who doesn’t need to eat but does so because it’s just an annoying function of life!

Then there are those who eat three days out of five and profess the virtues of their efforts to save the world in two days from its gluttony.

Perhaps willpower denies us joy? The story of Frog and Toad and willpower, by Arnold Lobel  has stuck with me since childhood. It perfectly illustrates where willpower becomes the thing rather than the pleasure of eating and sharing food with a friend. In the story Frog and Toad gorge themselves on cookies and yet there are plenty left. The friends use all sorts of means to curb their desire for the cookies. They practice willpower ( which apparently  means controlling  one’s impulses) and in the end they throw the remaining cookies to the birds to eat.

Willpower kind of dispatched joy! Toad recognises it , so even though Frog is proud he has practiced willpower, Toad declares that he is going home to bake a cake!

The longing for and the denial of food can make one hungrier than if time had been taken to enjoy the food in front of you. This year I am promising myself that I will be kinder to myself when I look in the mirror. I promise to take time to make friends with food and try to be less rushed. So I am turning off what is in my realm, that is the controlling impulse to say the negative first, switching that around to be body positive first in 2018!

Hope

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Why not hope?

Why not invite happiness in?

Leaving behind the dark days of second – hand soup – and yes my heart did sink, when he said that yesterday’s soup was tonight’s dinner, but even then I hoped that things would get better, but knew that perhaps no. Confirmed when we sat opposite one another on stiff backed chairs with a plank of wood between us.

A perfectly clean house filled with a museum of collectables . I was allowed to view a catalogue that begged praise.

And yet very little was asked of me but whether I liked the things he liked, it became an interview of sorts.  Later I listened to stories of his love for another…should have left then, stepped out the door and invited a different story in. Instead too polite I sat on the stiff chair, listening, my back aching eating the cheese I’d bought, followed by second hand soup.

I choose to invite a loving and abundant world where you stand equal,

not flattened by drivel of requests for saucy details and imagined performances and angry unanswered texts.

And so I am leaving behind insincerity, and those that would believe that they are doing you a favour to grace you with their fabulousness, I choose not to become something for a collection…

Age is not just a number if you lie about it…and you look like an older Richard Clapton and dye your hair black; just no! I am sure the Archangel he told me he saw at 15 would disapprove but then, he said he was an alien too!

You can say no and rather choose joy than grey and rise above it and keep hope alive.

A hopeful world with no gameplay just an is and perhaps an us.

Keep being the best you, because you are beautiful and kind and smart and funny. Shut off those voices and value yourself, be a better friend.

Why not hope?

Because you know dear reader, how much we humans like to dwell on the cracks and the flaws,

With me hope shines a million times brighter than hate and rejection ever can.

Dating is Groundhog Day

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Dating is an excruciating dance and lately it has begun to feel like Ground Hog Day , like the movie. Each dating experience, seem to be slightly different versions of the previous and I, seemingly trapped in an endless circle and not knowing how to change the script to make things different.

Often it feels like the script has been written already, and I am doomed to continue the dating cycle until I get it right.

there have been discoveries along the way like –

Just because you think you’re developing a relationship doesn’t mean they do!

Sex and feelings can be two different things

“I want you” Doesn’t mean they want you!

You may have a wonderful mind

You may have a beautiful heart

You may have a great arse and a hot bod but this does not mean you are a keeper.

Apparently.

Having faith in good things does not mean the world repays you.

I feel like Punxsutawny Phil (The Groundhog) ready to emerge and like Punxsutawny I am hoping for a cloudy day so that Spring will come early and good things and my keeper comes my way, rather than see my own shadow and have to retreat to my den (like Punxsutawny) and have Winter continue for six more weeks

 

 

 

 

Selfie

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What’s my status? That’s a photo of me ( taken by my Dad)  when I turned 16, unbelievable right! I was a teenager once! Now everyone can easily update their own status and profile pics unapologetically and seemingly unself-consciously. My status seems to be Mum.

Mum can you help? Mum can you buy? Mum can you pick me up?

This week I learnt that sometimes this Mum can’t fix everything.

On Tuesday I got called into the school office when my son knocked the top off a mole. It was bleeding profusely; they thought that I could help, but no instead, the sight of my son’s blood pouring down his chest, saw me turn white and queasy. Then there were two patients not one!

Later after helping with History and Religion assignments I tried to remain jolly and upbeat and not buy into my teenager’s melancholia. It can be hard work being a grown up and even more so when your status seems to be” just Mum”.

I remember the moment a date went bad when the guy muttered,  almost to himself

” The last girl I dated was a single mum with 3 children and so are you,”

He almost said this whimsically to himself. At that moment I knew he hadn’t understood me, despite walking through a museum for hours and sharing ice cream cones, he still saw me as just a single mum.

Maybe I should update my status? It seems updating your status is a way to express who you are and reach out and stay connected.

Currently my FB status says separated, but it’s been years and maybe it should say something else?

Like:

  • Gorgeous !
  • Hoping my ex divorces me soon, like he said he would!
  • Single and mingling
  • Dating
  • looking
  • Almost a girlfriend Ha ha!

Then there is the question of whether to update which groups you’re following or part of, or who you identify with. the list can become quite long: Geeky, Preppy, Academic, Hippy, Emo, Sporty, Political, Anarchist, Artist, Nature lover, Conservationist and Professional.

Can I just tick all the boxes? Is that okay?  Or just update my status on a given day that I am one of those and say something cute like,

“Today I am in full geek mode watching Star Wars movie marathon”

and another day;

“Feeling disappointed  and wondering why we pay our politicians so much when they ask us to vote on something that we made clear when we voted them in!”

In the end it’s up to you how much you share and wish to update but if you want people to know so they’re not left wondering and conversation can flow, go ahead and update your status, I just might do myself!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Passionate

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Passion lasts and lives inside your soul. Sometimes the banality of every day life may trick you and others into believing that you lead a passionless existence but it is never really true.

It can take many forms, it’s doing things not because you have to but because you want to. Wanting to make a kids day great, because success at school can mean everything! It can be hitting that groove in a song or on stage; where everything in that moment is balanced.

Then there are others who say there’s no need to chase passion, there’s plenty of time.  Or the time at a party you realised that even people a couple of years younger assumed you had no passion and instead turned to another to discuss the world of child rearing and still loving each other through sleepless nights.

Passionate passion doesn’t desert you despite

responsibilities

children/no children

greying hair

belly fat

longing, loving,

spark

Hear it in a laugh

See it sparkle in his eyes, taste it, feel it swell in your heart, touch it with an open hand. It is a flame that does not wither or sputter out but burns brightly..

So if you have a passion even if it is just the coals burning breathe, blow on it get that flame going and chase that dream because that’s where happiness lives!

 

 

 

I Want it Now!

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“BUT I WANT IT NOW!” he whines

“I’m hungry now, why can’t we get take away NOW?”

“Because I can make you something when we get home” I snap back

“But that will take TOO LONG!” He hrrumphs

How did I create little human beings who cannot wait, who want it now! Is it just me or are there other parents out there experiencing this lack of patience, lack of self-regulation? I have always been fair and firm but that doesn’t stop the whining. When I was a kid it was embarrassing to admit to an adult that you were bored, it was a sign to the world that you lacked imagination. Now there is no such embarrassment. I’m bored my youngest will say, surrounded by Lego, books and miscellaneous toys!

A sure way to sight my teenagers is if there is a problem with the WI-FI they emerge into the light screaming about what actually is,” A first world problem, I begin..,”

“Yeah, yeah, blah , blah mum, I have a whole seven other people on my team relying on me, come on you have to do something now!”

It seems like I’m beginning to sound a lot like my parents,

” Go and play, there’s plenty to do, have patience, just wait!”

But you know perhaps the rules really have changed, why go look up a word in a dictionary;  there is always an app for that. Same with places; an atlas to find a place? I can google It?

Technology has changed the rate of information exchange and answers. You can buy and find out stuff more quickly and easily so why wait? If a computer can answer you why can’t you in real life? I worry that the small discoveries we make on the journey may be lost.  We actually may find we know less when we rush and don’t stop to find out, really find out..

Actually it’s spilled over into adults too. We write a text now and expect a quick response , the same with emails!

The other day I joined a new dating site and experienced a fish frenzy of texts saying: “Hello!”

“What u doin?”

“Hi gorgeous want 2 chat?”

“Hi there cutie you caught my eye, want to chat?”

“Wanta go on a date?”

“Hi sexy any plans tonight?”

if I didn’t reply quickly enough they just moved on ( they hadn’t found out about me but my reply needed to be prompt); it was incredible. Indeed dear reader I found myself part of it to, I found myself lacking patience and after the mere whiff of interest and a couple of exchanges here was what was destined to be the greatest love in history! But no I was wrong and suddenly I was back, threshing about in the pond with everyone else! I just wish that the world would just slow down the pace and really look, but dear reader I think that is unlikely and I am going to have adapt and find some sort of balance between pondering and having it right now…

Unspiritual Reasons

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We were talking my son and I, about actually the life the universe and everything.

“Why am I still here and not there? ” I asked my wise old teenager!

“Well I can give you the nice answer or the straight answer, what do you want? ” He questioned

We discussed the fact that he could give me a lovely fluffy answer or perhaps a unspiritual reason stripped to the bare essential message.

Humans look for meaning in everything. even if the meaning isn’t an obvious one.

Even if it is a meaning you have found in random things like, a feather falling at your feet, repetition of numbers, or a prickly feeling when someone walks into the room.

But  horror of horror what if the unspiritual reason is that there is no meaning just randomness? Whoa, this is too big for my brain to grasp!

The brain always eagerly reaches out and helpfully finds somewhere to perfectly place everything. Unspiritual reasons lead to reasons. I asked my friend what she thought, because I can’t work out the meaning of it all, she  said,

“Don’t worry I’m still trying to work that out too!”

“Even those glamping-insta folk?”

” Yes even them!”

In midwinter (which barely touches the midwinter of folks in the Arctic) here in my island state we hold festivals. We gather around bonfires burning wicker men and asking spring to come. Really in the ungodlike, pagan way,  we kind of come together looking to find meaning together, rather than alone. In the unknown and the uncertain avowed agnostics say things like, “I believe in climate change” when really pure fact tells us that it is real. When did science and faith meet?

For now it is winter in my southern home where mountain and sea meet and I still look for meaning just like all those fabulous swans on FB who are probably paddling madly beneath the waters.

So for now there is, the IS and the AM

I am here because

  • My children are here
  • My job is here

“Two is enough unspiritual reasons, there doesn’t need to be anymore” He said

I think we make meaning from each other!