The Table

There’s a sensitivity that I carry for women.

I am a woman and my vagina poses plenty of stresses for me every day. It quite literally is the source of (coughs) my greatest pleasures and equally, my greatest anxieties.

August begins and woman mode for me is set on 110%. I’m walking into the office, chanting Worldwide woman by Beyonce, extra cocky when people ask me how I am. My response “I’m a woman. Are you kidding me, I’m resourceful thanks and you?”

The cockiness of this month for me comes from the knowing that all things femme – ALL things femme – are so sexy and important and beautiful and needed. And in the spirit of that knowing, I geared up to make sure that message lives through the month. Until something, I was a part of didn’t.

I went from an overwhelming sense of pride to a deep regret because I felt I had failed the cause. What was mine to own and what wasn’t, was not even a thought.
I was just low. And in the moment when I wanted to curl up and disappear, it was my name that I kept seeing on my timeline. I could feel the tense on the timeline, people I’d usually laugh with avoiding responses.

I had unconsciously alienated a huge part of who I’ve always claimed to care for. That’s very hard to be okay with, internally.

Women’s month just became heavy. I was fighting real battles of strength with myself on so many different levels, with no time to pause and reflect. And you know what the body does in those moments? It forces you to pause.

I could tell I was not myself, not too stable. I could see myself watching my behaviour like “Why are you doing that?’” but no external voice to stop me from doing that. Man.

Is this what it feels like? For an intense amount of people you had hoped to one day speak for in positivity to refer to you as “trash”. Trash? That is worse than cussing me out. I was the thing they wanted to throw away, the thing that had to be removed.

You know, when you watch something unfold from the public perspective, you gain such respect for public figures who endure unwanted commentary on a daily by virtue of profession.

Imagine being held to everything you say, at any given point, based on someone’s mood to either love you or loathe you on the day. Volatile.

You have to be ready for a congrats and then a middle finger, a tweet after that – constant up and down.

And here’s the thing, you can’t really anticipate when you’re going to raise an eyebrow until you raise an eyebrow.

But the risk of raising an eyebrow is what I’ve chosen to take from this whole experience. Raising an eyebrow means that you’ve taken a chance and a chance means that you’ve pushed your limits and a push means you’re ready to expect more from yourself and that means – you’re ready.

If that’s all I was meant to learn for the 8 weeks of self-loathing and angst I went through after that debacle ,the lesson is clocked and received, world.

I’ll be dining at square tables for some time, still.