Archive | February 2019

My New Year’s Resolution

I know we’re almost done with February, so a New Year’s resolution isn’t timely. The ads for diets and gyms that plastered the airwaves have faded, the gyms aren’t overcrowded, and we don’t see Ray Liotta for Chantix quite as much.

Although there are some who used to tell me what they thought I should (or should not) do to improve my life, they have no hand in this resolution, except perhaps being the architects of its necessity.

This year, 2019, I’ve resolved to like myself.

Or at least work at it.

It’s a hard thing.

I had heard for years, from people whom I trusted, that I was lazy, fat, self-indulgent, my own worst, enemy, a thief, a liar, irresponsible, slimy, bad sister/bad daughter/bad granddaughter, burden,user. I exercised too little and read too much.

Every time something goes wrong, my first thought is that this is what I deserve. If you’re raised in the Christian (not Evangelical, but basic Christian) mode, you are raised to believe that good people are rewarded and bad people punished, even if there isn’t a direct correlation apparent at the time.

We are told that we must love ourselves as we are. A lot of times, this is followed by “then you can make the changes you need.” Until I set fingers to keyboard to type this, I had not considered the absurdity of that concept.

I am a student of the Law of Attraction/Manifestation movement and that has taught me (though I don’t remember the specific source) that the two most powerful words are “I am” for what follows is what you believe about yourself.

So, it’s time to change the internal dialogue (and I do talk to myself in my head. You do, too. Don’t deny). It’s not easy. We’re talking 50 + years of habituated thinking to overcome. It’s not going to so much be positive, ego stroking as not condemning myself constantly.

Part of the change of thought needs to be the self-acknowledgement that, although my past choices may be biting me in the ass right now, I can’t go back in time and change them. I can only deal with the current situation and (even if it hurts) make the right, best decisions now without beating myself up for how I got there.

There are so many situations and issues that require my attention and effort right now that I want to curl up into a ball and hibernate (I know things are bad and stressful when I can sleep at the drop of a hat). However, I have only me to depend on, so no matter how tempting to ignore things, I must take action. No matter how much I want to wail about the unfairness of life because there are people (women) out there who would get help, goods, services thrown at them for a hangnail, but I have to take on bullies by myself. The internal dialogue has convinced me that I have gone to the well too many times, my causes (whatever they may be at the time) are not just, and “you made your bed; lie in it.”

I’ve not been in a 12 Step program, but I am familiar with the broad strokes, especially the “making amends” steps (I owe a lot of my knowledge to “Mom” and Mom). When I take these steps (usually financial) to deal with the consequences of previous decisions, I do not permit myself a “pat on the back” for having done so. The habituated thinking is “Had you not _____ in the first place, you wouldn’t be in this position!” I allow myself to think in terms of “that’s done.”

Like I said, most of my transgressions have been financial. Growing up, my family, although we weren’t given lessons in running a checkbook or responsibly using finances and credit, had an undeclared fixation with money. It was used as a means of control, family members would figure out ways of getting it out of each other. You were “good” if you didn’t ask for it, if you saved it, if you didn’t object that it wasn’t repaid in kind. One memorable explosion by my father was when I withdrew $5.00 from my own savings account. “Susan, you CHEAT!” He never elaborated on why or who I was cheating. Like I said, money equaled control. A lack of it reflected a moral failing. (On a grander scale, this is how we seem to regard poverty and weight. Not being on the “right” end of it is a clear indication of bad character).

I am still cleaning up after years of financial folly. Part of the “tape” in my head is my mother calling me a “thief” for running up  credit card debt and not repaying it. These comments always came after some debt collector had contacted her looking for me. (By the way, I have learned a ton about debt collectors and what they can/cannot do. One of their favorite weapons to get a promise to pay is shame. They should have hired Mom). Anyway, I hear her voice every day telling me that my circumstances are my own doing, I need to deal with it, and if I’m only getting paid $11.50, I should be grateful because clearly that’s all I’m worth. I hear my older sister telling me what a fool I am because I’ve earned a bunch of licenses and degrees and I’m not using any of them. Sure. Had I tried a little harder, I could have gotten a job as a lawyer. Had I been smarter, I would have maintained my relationship with Fidelity Investments to keep my Series 7 valid. If I applied myself harder, I could be coding websites now. It’s all my fault for expecting things to just happen for me.

In addition to paying back the IRS (I have a payment plan), I now have the US Dept of Education garnishing my wages, and frankly, with the shitty pay I get, I can’t afford to keep myself going, let alone Betsy Fucking DeVos. I THOUGHT the loans had been discharged through a bankruptcy court error in 2004, and I have managed to hold off collection efforts until now by sending a copy of the discharge to the collectors. Apparently no, and BFdV wants over $125 grand from me. (Oh, and that BK, which was really intended as a negotiating tactic for some creditors to work out a payment plan? My mother called me “slimy” for it) So I have THAT shit to shovel now, too.

As you can see, I don’t do things the easy way.

You hear a lot about “self-care” these days, and it’s a term applied to a universe of actions and thoughts. I don’t care for it, seeing as it’s a fashionable term and the concept is wide open to abuse, I think, as a rationalization for narcissistic behavior. I don’t believe I’ll indulge.

The negative self-talk is reinforce the self-loathing, which is beginning to morph into, “you know, you’re over 50, alone, and struggling. You’re not getting a decent job anytime soon. Why not exit stage right? Yeah, you saw the video today of the guy who jumped from the Golden Gate and survived, but that’s not you. You’re a giant damned failure and not going to redeem yourself.”

You see why I need to stop it. At least, for now, I still have to will to stop.

So, I will “cancel cancel” on the negative thoughts and work to reprogram. I will keep on keeping on. Detest my current job, but still do my very best at it while looking for something else (Pro tip: Sutherland Global Services is a crappy place if you’re not going in as part of management, and good luck with that because Command and Control is overseas).

It’s a step. We’ll get to the more positive thoughts later.

 

 

 

 

In a Word, It Isn’t

Image result for Isn't It Romantic

There are actors and actresses who can “sell me a ticket,” as I put it. You know; they are the reason you go to a particular movie.

Rebel Wilson is not one of them.

I have nothing against her. What I had seen of her work didn’t really make me a fan. Or hate her on sight. (I saw one or two episodes of her ABC sitcom, whatever it was called. Haven’t seen the “Pitch Perfect” movies)

Same with Adam Devine.

And Liam Hemsworth, although I enjoy living on a planet with multiple Hemsworths. The idea of standing in the middle of them is an entertaining one.

Image result for hemsworth brothers

Nothing against any of them, but none of them have ever motivated me to buy a movie ticket.

And yet, I went to “Isn’t It Romantic?”.

Part of my motivation was that I wanted something undemanding and stupid. My expectations were exceeded. What could have been a light-hearted and witty handling of skewering a genre turned out to be leaden, heavy-handed, and a waste of talent.

The plot: our heroine, Natalie, watched a shit ton of romantic comedies as a child and eventually turned on them. We have the near-standard “hit your head and end up in a parallel universe” (I think we blame “The Wizard of Oz” for that one) where the entire world is romantic comedy clichés. Of course, she fights against all of it, comes up with a big message, and wakes up back in her world, the end.

I seldom want to walk out on a movie, but this one, I wanted to run. However, since I saw it as part of my AMC A-List, I couldn’t get a refund, so I stuck it out. What can I say? Sometimes I’m a masochist.

If you don’t know me already, let me tell you something about myself: I’m fat. This will be important in a sec. I have a friend who prefers the term “juicy girl,” which (for the moment. That’s another post) is not as laden with negative baggage as the word “fat.” Going forward, we will talk about Rebel Wilson in juicy girl terms.

Here’s what REALLY bugged me about this movie: facial inequality or inter-facial dating, as I’ve seen it called.

Natalie (Rebel Wilson) has a professional job, architect. Not assistant or support staff or office manager. She is one of the ones to be assisted. She is smart, she’s gainfully employed (I wouldn’t judge it by her “In Real Life” (IRL) apartment because rents in New York City are ridiculous. She may be living in a closet, but she’s not sharing it with 3 other people). She is making it on her own. In actual real life, she’d be considered a good match (Honey, romance and falling in love at first sight is great for storytelling, but stability keeps things fresher longer). In the movie, she spies Blake (Liam Hemsworth) and falls in lust with him (Mama Hemsworth has some very handsome sons), while being friends with Josh (Adam Devine) whom she thinks is lusting after the woman in an ad. She is ignored by Blake while she ignores Josh. I would ignore Josh. Adam Devine is a skilled comic actor, but he’s not a Hemsworth by any stretch.

In the parallel head bonk universe, Blake Handsome falls in love with her, Josh Friend falls for the woman in the ad, Blake turns out to have jerk tendencies, and at the last minute, she realizes it’s been Josh all along blah blah blah.

We’re living in a world where the importance of representation is finally dawning on Hollywood, but it’s missing from this piece.

What we’re seeing here is reinforcement that fat people are not supposed to be with “pretty” people. Fat has been successfully demonized for decades as a moral failing, a physical manifestation of weakness and shame, and proof of a person’s bad character. If you want to see a fat person depicted as human, capable of being loved and admired, go see “Stan & Ollie” (which is EXCELLENT). And even then, they put John C. Reilly in a fat suit.

Fat women get short shrift in romance. It’s only in the fantasy realm that Natalie is considered a suitable partner for handsome, successful Blake. In her “real world,” she’s only good enough for Josh. As I said, Adam Devine is a very skilled comic actor, but he’s not a leading man.

Let’s let that sink in: the leading lady in a romantic comedy does not get the leading man type. Rebel Wilson is capable of leading a romantic comedy, but they’re not letting her get the handsome guy as, perhaps, Anna Kendrick or Jennifer Lawrence would have.

Yes, Blake is a jerk and Josh is a better person. However, I think other filmmakers would have engineered things a bit differently for another actress with another attractive (not necessarily Hemsworth) man in the Josh role, but with glasses and schlumpy clothing until the big reveal.

Why can’t fat people be seen as attractive? Would it upset the diet industry too much? Would it put Marie Osmond out of a job shilling for Nutrisystem? Too many billions of dollars at stake to let Rebel Wilson be anything more than a joke or second banana. (This thing needs to fail and when it does, they’ll blame her, not the crappy writing and execution)

Melissa McCarthy is revered. And she led a successful sitcom for years on “Mike & Molly.” Once again, though (and I enjoy the show in reruns. Great comic cast), she was paired with someone who was not a leading man (again, Billy Gardell is a deft standup and comic actor, but he’s not a Hemsworth).

Image result for mike & molly

In “Isn’t It Romantic?”, the pretty people are depicted as ultimately vain and shallow (another stereotype) and not worthy of love. But, I think the was to reinforce Josh as a more suitable choice for Natalie.

(Here’s where I honk my own horn)

I wrote “These Foolish Things” which depicts two people in their forties falling in love for the first time. Ty is Hemsworth (or Clooney) handsome and successful, Liz is overweight (not necessarily fat), has a professional career, lives on her own, and is a good, stable match. She’s insecure because, well, fat is a moral failing, dontcha know?

I wrote this as a response to all the romantic stories depicting the leads as twenty-somethings with perfect looks. I get escapism, but c’mon. How many kidnappings by motorcycle gangs, vampires, shape shifters, nobles in disguise, vampire motorcycle gangs, and undiscovered fashion models are too many?

Why not have a story where one could easily see herself as the heroine? “Hey! She’s like me!”

Are we trying to convince people who don’t fit the current model of beauty that they are not attractive? Of course, we’ve got a President* – who was just officially declared obese – who calls women who oppose him “fat pigs.” When I’ve been attacked on social media, the first thing they go for (usually men) is my weight or my looks (with makeup and hair done, I look okay. Without, meh). Men are usually running the studios and deciding which films get made under what conditions. What came out with the #MeToo movement was stories of male film execs making casting decisions on whether or not they thought a particular actress was “fuckable.” Not seeing much change going on.

What we have is a celluloid world (well, technically it’s digital these days) that refuses to depict juicy girls as genuine romantic leads. (I’ve seen pictures of these guys. They’re not Hemsworths)

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So much for representation.

Even if you are a huge Rebel Wilson/Adam Devine/Liam Hemsworth fan, save your money on this one. “Isn’t It Romantic?” isn’t.