Fear

Since I’m up I may as well write.

I dreaded the first day of school when the teacher would mis-pronounce my name. Had nightmares all summer about that first day and what was to come.  The dreaded take-off-coat-underwear nightmares.

My seat was in the back so I wouldn’t be noticed. When our music director called me in after school I thought I was in trouble. Then she made me look away while she played notes and I called them back to her (perfect pitch) then tried me out for the lead on Simon and Garfunkel’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water.” My Aunt Lorna cried at the concert, which I actually had the guts to perform.

My parents never fought but divorced instead after being married nearly 40 years. I thought that to get into a disagreement with a boyfriend was an automatic end of the relationship.

Even in politics I didn’t appreciate the fight because I always thought it was personal. It wasn’t until I took on a volunteer endeavor and was followed, harassed in public and worse that I realized it is personal and political and deals with whatever your values happen to be.

So you need to stand up for what you believe in. No matter what it is. If it’s important to you, do it. I did it when one of the boys took my winter hat off my head at age 9 on the school bus and ripped it in half. You live in a cold climate, you wear a winter hat. Ferry boys be damned, to this day.

I now make my point on a blog, in newspaper editorials (NYTimes and more); and in person. I know if it’s a woman everyone says it’s “strident” but this is what I have to give. It’s not angry, it’s very positive and a gift I give to you in poetry and prose. No, that’s not spelled Prozac. Dee in a Frank Sinatra Moment (3:00 in the morning).