Back in February I posted the following two posts...the comments basically fell along the lines of "we don't agree...you should read the history of the program, etc..."

Back in February I posted the following two posts...the comments basically fell along the lines of "we don't agree...you should read the history of the program, etc..."

What Makes the NHSC Application Culturally Biased?

This was the question posed by an anonymous poster in the comments section of the related post. I will try to explain it here...

So. The point of the NHSC is to get med/pa/cnm/fnp students to work in economically depressed areas (which they call Health Professional Shortage Areas or HPSAs) which are in critical need of providers. The vast majority of professional students are middle to upper class non-minorities that do not come from these areas. Keeping that in mind, let's break down a question that is on this year's application/personality assessment:

Choose A or B:

A. "I would like to work in a community where the people and activities are different than those I grew up with."

B. "I would like to work in a community where the people and activities are the same as those I grew up with."

When advised about how to fill out this application (by people who were successfully awarded the scholarship) I was told "the answers they want to hear are obvious." I believe the answers are obvious to the majority of people filling out this questionnaire because the majority of people filling it out (students in professional schools) are NOT from HPSAs and they are supposed to be answering questions in a way that indicates that they are committed to working in these HPSAs...and therefore the "obvious" answer is "A" because if you want to work in the kind of community you (being the med student who's filling it out) grew up in, chances are that community doesn't qualify as an HPSA. Get it?

So, what happens if you happen to be one of the very, very few people who actually grew up in an HPSA? Technically, you should be circling "B" because the area you want to serve is actually the same kind of area you grew up in...but I don't think scantron-style reading of these bubble assessments will be taking that into consideration, which makes me wonder if someone in this situation shouldn't be answering as the typical professional school student, or themselves...and *this* is why I feel the assessment is culturally biased.

But anyway, I will tell you that I have already resolved all of this in my mind and am no longer really thinking about it. I am just going to fill out the form truthfully, and let the universe handle the rest.

Saturday, February 17, 2007

NHSC is Not Doing Interviews for 2007

The National Health Service Corps is not conducting interviews for its 2007-2008 scholarship cycle...it just never ends with this program.

Let me start from the beginning. When I was applying to grad school, I found out that there really isn't any good financial aid for programs like mine (direct-entry/grad-entry programs in nursing, also called bridge programs) nor for graduate professional school in general. Everyone speaks of one or two programs when considering aid: the National Health Service Corp Scholarship & Loan Repayment Program, and the Scholarships for Disadvantaged Students Program. (The Nursing Scholarship Program is mostly for undergrads)

NHSC does not accept students in bridge programs, so we apply after the first year when, technically, we are no longer in a bridge program. You can see a snipet of the history of NHSC here, pay specific attention to the "NHSC milestones." Over the years, the program has been reducing its scholarship offerings in favor of the loan repayment program, which costs them less to provide, and in the '80's there was a severe decline in aid because the country expected a physician surplus. At this point, the program is almost all loan repayment, and I predict that in the next few years the scholarship will no longer be offered. I believe this will directly impact the number of minority physicians and APRNs because I have read articles stating that at times the number of minority students in this program exceeds 50% of the total of participants. (I will try to find a public link to one of these articles or at least tell you the name of it so you can look it up!)

The problem this year is that they all of a sudden decided not to conduct interviews for this program! Instead, they will select awardees based solely on their application...an application that has no essay, no place to indicate involvement in the community or any other volunteer experiences, no way to indicate who you are! How do you select people like this? The application is basically a personality assessment...and it happens to be culturally biased. I think the interviews were crucial to the selection process, and that in the absence of these interviews the demographics of their awardees will change significantly...that is unless they use the demographic section of the application to select a specific percentage of minority and non-minority applicants...is that still legal?

Anyway, all of this is just to say my number one plan for funding the next two years of school looks like it just fell through. I'm still applying, but interviews are a strength of mine, and with only the application it doesn't look good. The positive is that I can just stay and go straight to the doctoral program (maybe part time, I'm tired of school).

Oh! And the problem with the Schlarships for Disadvantaged Students Program is that none of the schools I applied to participate. You must apply through the financial aid office of your school. When I asked about this, they said that they don't meet the requirements for the program - mainly, they don't have enough minority students enrolled to qualify for the program, which seems backwards to me...

*************************************NEWS ALERT

The have changed the application yet again to include 5 mandatory essay questions...questions they used to ask in the interviews.

I ain' crazy...I bet that last batch of acceptances were not as diverse as the

Infertility in the News, cont. from comments

Navelgazing I'm not even sure we disagree (yet). I can understand why *some* people want to adopt. I can understand bonds to children that are not biological...I have plenty of those. Like I said, I understand the pregnancy vs parenting question - just not the judgement...and those first few comments are full of judgement. Just because you found adoption/step parenting to be wonderful, that doesn't mean that it's good for everyone...and I really, really disagree that being infertile some how means that you should automatically consider adoption...or take on the abandoned children of the world. Some people DO understand the need for biological connection and the process of being pregnant, giving birth, AND parenting...and want that, or they will choose to live a childfree or childless life. That's *their* choice.

I was raised by a stepfather in conjunction with my bio father and I most certainly called him on father's day, in fact I called before my bio father, not on purpose, just whoever I dialed first. And I have had a hand in raising a child or two that I love more than I could ever imagine.

But that's not the point...the point I was making is that adoption is not the cure for infertility.

Adoption does not suddenly cure the grief.

Adoption is not for everyone, and there should be NO PUSH WHATSOEVER for infertile couples to adopt anymore than there is for fertile couples to do so.

I believe the word I used was SAD. It does make me sad that this is hard for people to understand. I also said we are lacking in compassion, and I meant it. These posts are about having compassion and understanding for those who are in the throes of infertility, and so was the article...NOT about how wonderful adoption is. That is another story, and I'm sure you can find plenty, plenty of them on the WWW. But there is very little public compassion for people, especially women, who can not have children - despite the fact that this country has always conflated womanhood and motherhood.

I think adoption can be/is wonderful.

But I think infertility is a separate experience and should be acknowledged/respected/compassionately handled as such.

It's like Walking...

You just keep putting one foot in front of the other...one word after the other.

Yeah, that was my weak ass epiphany.

I was gonna write something over at darkdaughta's about how I came to love men. We've been...scratch that... I've been avoiding this conversation over at her place for months. Well, not exactly this one, but just conversation about compulsory heterosexualism and christianity and monogamy in general. But now I'm going to start it over here, and then post it in the comments over there somewhere (to make sure I'm not running from whoever just found me over there...and because there is no longer a link back to my place from over there)

Why now? I don't know. I think about my life, all of it, all the time. But I never write about sexuality, christianity, or love either, really. I also hardly write about the man. I think most of this is because this is not what my blog is about. I do occasionally get personal here, but really I write about school-getting here, staying here, and eventually leaving from here. I write about myself as it relates to school.

But school's out.

So. When I was younger, I didn't have a lot of friends - not because I wasn't cool...but because my family is huge. I mean really huge. There are so many cousins that we could hold an official sports game, crowds included, without any help from anyone else. I had no need for too many extra people to play with, I had too many as it was. This lack of need for too many outside friends is still kinda true to this day...that is, if I actually lived near my family I would not need very many other people in my life. But as I got older and started going to school, maybe the 6th grade, I began to have a decent number of friends who I kept up with. They were all girls. The friends I had that were boys were just neighborhood boys that I saw around. As soon as I started making friends I realized that I was not your typical little girl. I didn't care enough about boys. I didn't care enough about make up. I didn't care enough about the 'cute' clothes. I cared..I wanted to wear make up, I wanted to wear clothes that I thought were cute, but not for the same reasons and not the same kinds that my friends were dying to wear...the kinds that made the boys turn and look. I liked to paint and draw and color, and make up to me looked like a lot of fun, and I loved doing my hair in so many creative ways. Soon enough, junior high (7th and 8th grade) it was made very clear to me by girls, that I was not good friend material. I can only listen to you talk about boys for so long...that's when they kind of girls I hung out with changed. I opted for the rougher, tom-boy girls. Girls who didn't spend all day talking about boys. And we had a lot of fun times, a lot of rage was expressed, and I learned to spit, and fight, and curse "like a boy." But as it turns out, those same girls, by high school (9th grade) had crossed over to the other side! I had not. It was so sad. I missed them. I missed their boldness, now turned coy. Now batting eyes at boys. Now squeezing into the tight jeans, on a diet...always on a damn diet. They ditched me. Called me names like butch and gay and dike. (It didn't help that I dressed like a boy a lot) I never lashed out against those terms, believing that "being defensive just makes you guilty." Yep, back then being gay was something you were 'accused' of (and still is, I realize) So what's a girl to do? I said screw them, and found girlfriends who weren't as caught up in the hormone fest. Girls who were shunned because they were too smart, or too fat, or too black, or whatever else is 'bad' in teenage girl terms....that and...boys. I found boys. Boys who I wasn't interested in for the same reasons as other girls were interested in them, but because they seemed to be so laid back. (I would later learn that black boys learn how to look this way...how to always seem as though they have no feelings, no emotions, when standing in front of others) But back then all that mattered was that I didn't have to have on make up and I didn't have to be anybody else but me (I thought then) and I could hang with them, no strings attached. They let me hang out, they treated me as equal (as far as I knew what equal was back then...which doesn't look like equal to me right now) and they didn't call me names. I still had a few girlfriends that were very cool girls, and for the most part we keep in touch, but I didn't hang out with them as much as I did those boys.

Eventually things got even crazier with girls because they couldn't understand why I got to hang out with the boys when that's all they ever wanted to do. So then of course I became even gayer to them. Still, no problem...by this time I hated "females" anyway - except those who had managed to stay true. I was an easy person to make fun of - I was (am) fat, dark, and had short hair - all cardinal sins in girl world in the 90's. I didn't have my first boyfriend until I was 18 years old. This was on purpose. I had been propositioned many times, but I was determined not to have sex until I was 18 because so many of my cousins and the girls around the way had had babies too early. Yep I figured when I got a boyfriend I'd be screwing, therefore, there was no reason to have one until I was ready to give up the panties. My first boyfriend was 28 years old. (Yeah mama, 28 - don't have a heart attack) I know what that looks like, but hey, I was 18, and had very little patience for boys my own age because by this time I knew what they were like - I mean I had spent the last four years in their intimate space. Plus, I had been working A LOT since the day I became old enough to work, had my own stuff and was moving into my own place as soon I walked across the high school graduation stage. We had a good time, me and him.

So what does all of this have to do with heterosexuality? Girls have turned me OFF for most of my life. In the beginning they were so cool...I remember the slumber parties and I had a good start with attending Girls Inc most of my life. But then it changed with the hormones...they became snottier, and meaner, and boy crazed, and down right hateful. It wasn't until I saw all of that in myself...could appreciate it in myself...that I stopped hating them in general...I am just now getting to place where I crave interaction with women. I wish i had more/closer girlfriends.

More layers to come...

Thinking

...of how I can continue to write.

Infertility in the News

This article was recently printed in The New York Times:

Facing Life Without Children When It Isn't by Choice

And then the comments came...

I think it must be a natural response to ask an infertile couple if they will adopt. I'm not sure why people can't understand that it's not the same. I understand the "do you want to raise children?" or "do you want to be pregnant?" questions, but I do not understand the judgment that comes after the answer. I would raise the children of people I know intimately, but I would not adopt a random child. If something happened and a child was placed in my arms, I would not leave it on the side of the road, but I will not be going out to look for such a child. And my first instinct would not be to keep the baby placed in my arms...straight to the police station we would go.

There's a lot I could say. But you know what, I don't feel like it. I'm sad that people dont/can't get it. I'm frustrated that our compassion is virtually non-existent in this country.

I really love comment #50.

I'm glad people point out that the article is lacking people of color and men.

What Has Happened

So much has happened. So much happened before I abruptly went private for the second time in my blog life. I contemplated seeing if I could sum it up in one sentence...because, really, does it matter what happened? Or is what is happening now, and what will happen in the future matter more?

I freaked completely out. But before this, so much other stuff happened, including this moment in some other universe when a professor called me out about my blog in front of my entire midwifery cohort. There it was, a public outing, real, unquestionable, unchangeable loss of anonymity. I built walls around my 'home' immediately. Self preservation instinct maybe. Maybe not. Nonetheless, I closed up shop here very quickly, and have been out of business ever since.

It's all a jumbled mess in my head, and all I ever get out is "they're crazy." But it's more than that. This experience has changed me, it continues to change me, even while I resist some of the things I find most damaging. Resisting is hard. Maybe too hard. I believe in giving in to some extent, because I think you have to give in order to grow, in order to change into who you want to be or who you could be if who you think you want to be could move out of the way. But then there are other things that I am not at all interested in changing, things that matter to me no matter what kind of system or culture I currently find myself in. Those are the things I will fight for, resist for, stand for all the time, every time.

Or will I?

I lost half the hair on my head over the past semester. I will have to cut it off and start over.

Stepping Away from the Ledge

Today I came across the blogs of several classmates. They have come into my life secondary to all the pings they've accumulated between each other as Down's Fellows and through their facebook promoting. They are not at all concerned with anonymity nor do they fear backlash for the words they choose to put to the page. Pictures abound.

The first thing that came to my mind when I started reading was freedom. That's what they have. So much space to write, to think, to feel. Sadness wells up inside my chest.

I miss my blog. I miss what my blog stood for. I miss that feeling of "if nothing else, I am helping the next." I miss having a place to come to where I can dump my thoughts and see them again, where I can claim space without explanation. I am only now realizing the full magnitude of what my own blog means to me. It was like an external brain. Sometimes I wrote in altered consciousness and only realized it when I went back and read something that I didn't remember writing or that I didn't realize I had such strong feelings about until I read my words on the page. I felt empowered by reading my own words. This was a home away from home. I have lost my home.

I had a revelation the other day...I stopped writing here because it no longer felt safe. My home no longer felt safe. But even after making it so private that I have only 3 readers, I still don't write because now my purpose for writing eludes me. It is not as though I need an audience to write...but remember the saying "if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?" It's like speaking with laryngitis...you can have important stuff to say, but if no one hears it, what did you really say?

To be fair, I understand that it probably won't always be like this. But in the same token...I will never live what I'm living in these present moments again either...they have to be captured as they are, as they happen, before time erodes the emotion behind the words.

When it comes to this blog, I don't know what I'm doing...where I'm going...anymore. It was supposed to be an act of self preservation to privatize, but it doesn't feel like preservation, it feels like death.

I'm trying to back away from the ledge that leads to the abyss that is my life after silencing my voice in this place, but I don't know how...

Placeholder for Love

because it is utterly impossible for you to believe that orgasms are not merely of the clitoral stimulation kind...

because it blows your mind that reading "white solipsism- to think imagine and speak as though whiteness described the world" for the first time sent tingles up my spine

because even though you might not get it, you don't get in the way of my gettin' it...pun intended

that is why, boy, that is why

One Day Back in April When I was Losing It

I want to get away from them. Seriously, their voices are like fingernails on chalkboards. I feel like I'm in an alternate universe. A Stepford wives, Pleasantville type of place. Where there is only one way of being, knowing, interacting. Where those who don't smile all day and curtsy, and pretend to care about the mundane are destined to be called mean, angry, and otherwise difficult. Where, when, and why did women learn that they were only to agree and acquiesce? Why am I expected to play nice, and pretend I want to stand around and talk to you? What is it about you that makes you think your time is worth more than mine? I pulled myself outside of my own head and showed up today. I sacrificed the sliver of sanity I have left to attempt engagement. I showed up for your 1:15 meeting that you scheduled all by yourself without regard for what the other 12 or so people in our class wanted to do or already had planned for today. So when, at 1:25 I'm still standing in the hall for the meeting to start, I think it's perfectly warranted that I ask if there is really going to be a meeting? The fact that you don't know pisses me off. I have so much to do. This is the only reason I came to school today. The only reason I packed up my stuff and dragged it all the way here. The only reason I battled those dreaded earth worms and the rain. No, there is no smile wrapped in a pretty bow for you today. There is no mask, what you get is me. In all my beautiful realness. No, I don't want to hear about your birth, that's not why I came in today. No, I don't want to hear about the international trip that's coming up and watch you all argue over who should have the right to go...and why, please tell me, since you're already going for other reasons, do you need to go to the meeting other than to talk nonstop about what you think? I'm so sick of hearing what you think. I'm so sick of other people sitting around giving you so much space to put what you think on the table while everyone else fights for their word. I'm so sick of you answering everyone's questions that they ask to someone else. I'm so sick of your voice. I don't even know how to explain that to people, but it is like what Claudia was talking about in The Bluest Eye...

Revelation & Affirmation

When a woman is in transition...the hardest part of labor...you can not ask her about what will happen tomorrow or the next day, or even five minutes from where she is right then. She can not hear you. She can not think of anything other than what is happening for her right then, in that moment, with that breath. When we are with laboring women, we recognize and remember this. We do not ask her to make important decisions, because there is a great possibility that her ability to do so is altered. We are patient, and forgiving, and encouraging, even when she swears (and truly believes) she can not do it.

I am taking this moment to fully acknowledge that I am in transition. I am putting it down on paper that I am in no condition to make major decisions, and therefore am giving myself the next 4 weeks to suspend such responsibility. I am making the commitment to be kind, patient, forgiving and encouraging to myself.

Where I am does not define who I am.
I am me, regardless of who I could be, should be, am wanted to be, or am thought to be.
I am loved, if by nobody but my mama and me.
And that is enough.

Ramblings, Part 1: Of course...

I'm coming back, DrJen, lol.

I'm a little on the edge right now. Poked my toe in the water, but jumped back.

I'm going through.

Thinking. Thinking critically. Trying not to make rash decisions. This is when I should be blogging most, but this is when there's the least amount of time to do so. I also have a hard time writing coherently when my mind's on fire. But then other times it helps to just purge it out onto the page. I don't know which one this will be ultimately, but I can at least manage a list:

• I'm in the process of going through IRB for my thesis, which is a headache, to say the least.

• My school schedule is overwhelming me...the two days of clinical + one or two days of call + two days of class + my little part time job are starting to feel very heavy. I will not be working at the library after the end of this semester. People often think my exhaustion has to do with trying to write a thesis on top of everything else...but actually my thesis is the one thing that is giving me much joy at the moment. It is the only thing that I actually want to do when I sit down to work on it. And with the phenomenon I'm looking at being racial fatigue and the critical framework being that of black feminist thought...I'm sure it's obvious to my loyal readers why this is the most enjoyable part of my education at the moment...I mean, I was introduced to standpoint theory and the cultural contract paradigm over the last two weeks and had to stop and thank the universe for giving me something, anything, to get out of bed for. ;o)

• I am trying to get my stuff together for the NCLEX, which is not only a pain the financial, organizational ass, but also a pain in the brain because I think it's silly that I need to be licensed as a RN to be a midwife in the first place, but that's another blog (and I'm sure someone has already tackled it) and at this point I just 1)find the money and 2)follow the directions...and then at some point I need to 3)find time to study for it.

• I am petitioning for summer funding...for work and also the ACNM conference which, I think, is absolutely ridiculously priced...why would you choose a hotel that has a group rate of $200 per night as the cheapest room option? Especially for a conference that's nearly a week long? And why would your reistration fee be almost $400 for students? But I need to go because that's where I'm planning to interview at least 2 students for my thesis.

• Speaking of funding and writing checks...I filled out my FAFSA and got the shock of a lifetime when my EFC came back nearly 6 grand for the 2008-2009 school year. I gasped, but I didn't cry. I printed it, put it away, and will deal with it later.

• I'm failing a class. Actually, half the class is probably failing the class. PHARM. I study more for the weekly quizzes in this class than I do for midterms and finals in my midwifery courses...and still I'm failing. Stressin me out. And I've lost like 30ish dreads, I was trying to count last night...I might have to chop it. Whatever, been there, done that a few times before.

• Lastly, the more I'm learning, the more I'm hating midwifery. There. I said it. It's not just school...this always happens with me in school because I don't now, nor have I ever, really cared for school. Even when I was a little girl I hated school. I'm good at it most times, and I love learning, especially through reading and writing, but classes...multiple-choice exams...people interaction...memorization...I hate it. But now...it's midwifery. They way I'm learning it...all complications, no trust in birth whatsoever. So much primary care. Hypertension + meds. Diabetes + meds. High cholesterol + meds. Anemias and blood diseases + meds. Genetics, genetics, genetics. Ugh. Seriously, if I had known...I might not have done it, and that's the first time I've said that I think. If I had known that all I'd study were complications, that I wouldn't know the women I was delivering, that there'd be very little continuity of care (start at the purple), I might have just skipped it. Everything is a risk. We're just waiting for something bad to happen. I know more about pre-ecclampsia than I do a 'normal' labor curve. And lastly on this topic...I had interesting conversation with someone about this whole clinical practice vs research careers in nursing and midwifery thing. This someone has done both, and is now conducting research and teaching. I was saying how frustrating it is that people are not 'allowed' to just say, "ya know, I really do want to just be a nurse researcher/scientist." It is taboo to say or do this without 'putting in time' in the field. People say you must work in the field to be able to talk about the field...that nurses, midwives, are always first and foremost clinicians. Well, while I certainly think that clinical practice is the backbone of nursing and midwifery and obviously very helpful, and a clinical population is necessary for clinical research, I do not think there's a certain amount of clinical practice experience necessary to be a good researcher...that is to say that I believe there is also honor in conducting (and building a career in) NON-clinically based nursing and midwifery research...what about our historians? Our stastititians? Our theorists? Instead, there is an unspoken expectation that most of a nurse/midwife's research will be clinically based and then she (or he) will periodically, whenever time permits, research those 'other' things. I am noticing that I happen to be more interested in those "other things." Another professor, whom I respect because she does all three (clinical, research and teaching - quite well, too) reminded me one day when she sat down as I was eating my lunch, that really, you need a clinical practice if you're doing clinical research because that's the easiest way to access subjects. It makes sense, no argument from me there. I think the vast majority of people go into these professions with the plan to practice clinically. So did I, among other things. But I also think there needs to be room for acceptance of those who have a different plan, and that room requires respect for people's knowledge of self...which I'm finding lacking in this place right now. Some of us will go into law, or policy, or administration, or education, or something else entirely. But we are all still midwives...right? Why should students be afraid to say that they don't think they will practice clinically? I have met students who are afraid to say it. And after meeting with that person above, who actually counseled me that if I ever felt disenchanted with the clinical practice of midwifery to NEVER, EVER tell my midwifery faculty that (she was also the person who said to never tell your teachers/preceptors that you never want to work as a bedside RN...she was right about that - there are consequences), I understand why they're scared. That's ridiculous...where's that circle of safety, now? Where's the trust? Where's the room for intellectual stimulation outside of the pathophysiology of labor and birth? Where's the space for critical thinking about not only one's assessment and plan for the management of the patient, but also the assessment and plan for one's career and life goals...for one's self preservation and growth? How is it that a faculty of midwives can not see when student midwives need midwiving? I believe they feel obligated to 'toughen us up' for the profession we are joining and the climate in which that profession finds itself. But there is more to raising a midwife than tough love. I'm fading. And if I'm fading, with my history of perseverance, then I know others are, too.
  

I'm back.

Virtual Postcard

Having such a great time!

Be back with a full report!

LP

Into Open Arms

Reflecting on the day I was born makes me think of my mother.

At 4:32 she risked death (have I beat you over the head enough with the maternal mortality stats for black women?), insanity, and her identity to give me a chance.

I got a card in the mail from my daddy. That is his way, I love it.

He still sends me Valentine cards, too, no matter where or how old I am.

It's such a contrast to the man who doesn't do much of any of it, which is also fine by me. The man is practical which I love.

I have a midterm today.

And a pharm quiz.

I'll be at school from 8ish to 6ish....deep breaths...

Ugh. I just wanna go somewhere and write.

I'm so sick of school.

I'm on auto piolot now.

Usually I make my birthday its own holiday but we happened to have midterms, so that was out.

That's ok, there's always Paris...in 4 days. Yeah. 4. OMG.

I was saying to someone last week that I was ready to have kids not because my clock is ticking, but because I have this odd feeling of my body settling in on itself. Getting comfortable.Bones setting into their final place...fat shifting into it's final place.

"I feel old," I said.

But it wasn't upsetting. It was relief. But still odd.

I was born today, 28 years ago.

On purpose.

To people who wanted me, were waiting on me.

And for a very long time, there was only me.

It has made a difference in my life.

I think of Brittany and I am happy. And sad. And grateful.

I woke up today.

My middle name is Joy.

Today, more than ever, that means something.

"Where is He?" (Purging for Space)

I see the comments...I'm happy to have them...I'll get to them soon...

Right now I'm just purging stuff from my brain so I can have mental space to study for midterms, the first of which is in less than a week...

We had a school event to celebrate a milestone in the program, and I was not really all that interested in going. It was on my usual work night and I had waited to the last minute to ask someone to cover me because I wasn't really sure if I was going anyway. I got the coverage and ended up going, mainly because I wanted to be supportive of U, who was delivering the speech for the evening. I left quickly afterward, no need to stay for schmoozing, wine, and food. Plus, I had already celebrated this milestone last summer, and that was plenty sufficient...good times, good times. I wanted to get home to the man who was celebrating a milestone himself- one full year of full time work at the same job. His first. EVER. He is so not a 9 to 5-er. And I can appreciate that. I'm not either. To get up and go to work every day to a job that you don't care about one way or another...a job that has nothing to do with your passion in life...a job that doesn't give a damn about you or even tries to purposely bring you down...it sucks. hard. So I wanted to acknowledge his committment... sacrifice... that allows me to get the education to do my life's work. As far as I'm concerned, he can't get away from this kind of work fast enough. We're working on a plan to align his passions with work that earns income. But in the meantime, he's chugging along. We're chugging along. So I couldn't get out of there fast enough. But while I was there, I was annoyed by how often people wanted to know where he was and why he wasn't there to "support" me. Couples, both hetero and gay, were all over the place. It was freaky to me...like a dog and pony show, or a contest. Couples, arm in arm, hand in hand, beaming. Scary beaming. Yeah, they were happy, but it was off. Like, look at us...we're a couple, a happy couple. This is what love looks like! There was one woman who asked me where he was and I said "oh he's at home" and she said "why didn't he come?" and I said "because I didn't need him to" and she said, "oh, we'll talk after!" cause we were leaning over someone else having this conversation. Needless to say I didn't have a conversation with anyone "after." She was not at all unpleasant. I was just sick of the question. It was almost like I wasn't supposed to be seen without him, unless I had a good excuse. Like, yeah, no one brings their mate to class or to work with them, but every where else...well, where is (s)he? Ugh. This only mattered this time because it's happened SO many times before...all kinds of events, especially the ones where partners are invited, especially parties, people wanna know why he didn't come with me. When I got home I was telling him about it, and we wanted to know if I wanted him to make an appearance...probably because I was going on and on. No. Of course not. I do periodically check in as to why he doesn't want to go to a certain thing, because I want to know what he's thinking about it...like, are you angry at someone who's going to be there? Do you need time away from me and just aren't admitting that? Are you intimidated? Bored? He's internal, sometimes I check in...no, a LOT of times I check in. Anyway, he said something about my ranting that hit me hard.

"I think you think that because they never see us together and keep asking about it, they think we don't love eachother, and I know that that would really piss you off if they thought that."

Bull's eye. Damn.

(I can't stand you, maaaan. lol)

Now the question is, why do I care?