On Dance Festivals, Sexual Predators, and Bolton Spa — L.

[Trigger Warning: Scenes of sexual harrassment]

Saturday, June 17th, 2023, Shabbos:

Of all the days for it to rain all fricking day! Today Lynn, Lauren, me and another friend of Lynn’s were all going to go hiking and go to spa Bolton. I planned it in advance even with Dance Extravaganza happening, which means I’ll be missing the talent show. That sucks because last year it was really fun; I had finally gotten out of quarantine from Covid and it was the only part of the festival I participated in.

But given how I’m feeling about the festival right now, I’m pretty glad I made backup plans. Except for the rain.

The dishes in my kitchen had piled up this week because I’ve been living like a mad artist. So yesterday I got ready to do them, when a sudden voice inside my head said really loudly, I need to meditate. And I was like, okay! I’ll do it once the dishes are done! And the voice was like, Right. Now.

So I listened. I put on a new binaural beat I found on Youtube and headed outside to my terrace, which is lovely, except for the city smog, which is not.

I’d only had my eyes closed for about a second when I opened them back up again and realized that I needed to write.

So I wrote. Vomit. Splat. Out on the page. You want to offer me emotional support? I’ll take your emotional support.

Why the fuck are you letting a predator run loose at a festival?!

After I sent the message to Gale and Owen, I sent a copy to Etienne. I had already kind of told him what was going on in our sensitive thread, but the message summed it up way better than my previous attempts had done. It was only when I sent it that I realized how vulnerable I’ve felt, opening up to him about it, not sure what his reaction would be. His attitude is very much like, let’s all be friends, and he has a lot of not-been-molested-much male privilege.

But he’s also super empathetic and willing to consider new perspectives and learn and grow, and I’m learning to trust that he won’t be angry when I express feelings, chiefly because, to date, he never has gotten angry when I express feelings.

(Gavin used to all the time, quite meanly. It’s because he didn’t know what to do with them, and his reaction to the unknown was to puff up like a proud pigeon and reject anything he didn’t understand.)

It was a relief, once I sent those messages. It felt like I’d taken the weight of responsibility off my chest and given it to the people to whom it belonged. I turned my phone off, and I meditated for real.

I felt raw, but good raw. Like I’d gotten the toxins out of me. I decided I was overdue for a yoga class (I hadn’t been to the studio since before Lake George and Portland). It was perfect, exactly what I needed. The challah also didn’t seem to mind the extra two hours of rising time.

There’s one person for sure whose reaction to my message is going to be a 100% for certain HELL YES YOU ROCK, KITTEN!

Who?

Mommy. That’s who.

I’m Mommy’s little consent kitten. Her Boundaries Boss Bitch Baby.

One time, when I was with Fuckface, somebody touched me the wrong way.

That isn’t the bad part, though. Idiots will be idiots. I mean it was terrible, don’t get me wrong. I was violated. I felt rage.

But it wasn’t the worst part.

The worst part was that when I went to run after the idiot, to teach him a lesson and clock his face so I could let personnel know to give him Consequences…or to maybe just educate a terribly misinformed little turtle of a boy…

I couldn’t move.

Because Gavin was holding my arms back.

When I struggled, he whispered scornfully into my ear, “I don’t want you to cause a scene and ruin the night.”

I’m still furious about that one. It was almost worse than the guy who touched my breasts. When he touched me, he violated a physical boundary. But Gavin violated my very autonomy and self-preservation.

If Etienne had been there, he would have cared far more about my well-being than what some strangers might think of him.

If Mommy had been there, the man’s balls might no longer be connected to his body.

In either case, my dignity and emotional security would have remained intact, and I would have been able to self-actualize to my fullest potential. That’s why Mommy is Mommy, Etienne is Etienne, and Gavin is FuckFace.

It’s crazy because a few years ago, when #metoo was happening, I remember thinking, That sucks for other people, but I really can’t relate.

!!!!

The truth is, I have dozens of #metoo stories. Most people do, when they think hard enough.

Last week in Portland, I told Patrick about one that happened to me in the most innocuous place you could think of. I wasn’t alone in a city after dark; I wasn’t wearing a slutty outfit; I wasn’t at a swinger club…(Not that any of those are actual reasons to blame me.)

No, this particular #metoo story happened on an airplane.

What happened was, last year on my way to Joseph and Lizzie’s, I made the mistake of politely responding to a man beside me who initiated conversation during the last half hour of our flight.

Somehow, my opening my mouth was interpreted by the man as tacit permission to lean into my personal space, connecting his entire body with mine and and touching/smacking my leg with his hand repeatedly in order to punctuate the things he said in what quickly became an entirely one-sided conversation.

In an airplane, where you already have no personal space.

I was trapped between the man and the window. He kept leaning in closer. I felt severely uncomfortable.

My only option was to say something to him, say something to a flight attendant, or do nothing.

I did nothing.

“Why didn’t you just say something?” asked Patrick. I almost retorted, wow, that’s very victim blamey.

Instead I said, “Have you ever been harrassed and gaslighted by a narcissistic boundary-breaker?”

He shook his head and gave an honest “no.”

“I can’t be certain it wasn’t an innocent, exuberant mistake that he was touching me like that,” I continued, “but he was certainly careless with boundaries. And the thing is, boundary-breakers tend to follow very predictable patterns. So there was a real fear that if I had confronted him, he likely would have acted super wounded, hurt by my ‘overreaction,’ made me feel shitty for having said something, and I still would have been trapped next to him. The plane was already about to land, and I just didn’t have the emotional energy for a confrontation.”

There was another one, a long time ago. I was a teenager, on a flight to Europe. There was a really old man sitting beside me who started to make obscene jokes. I think he also touched me. I can’t remember. That time I did call over the flight attendant, and I remember that one of us switched seats.

There are times when I wonder if the common denominator is me. If I’m the problem.

Then I remember the statistics.

Maybe if I had a cushion of a family, one husband upon whom I could rely, and several carefully-chosen friends. Maybe then I would not be seen as prey to the predators?

But it has followed me my whole life. My karate teacher, when I was 12. A community friend when I was 16. Men who have been strangers. Men I have trusted and loved. Lots and lots of terrible people, mostly men. I’ve been lucky enough to dodge a few bullets (I trusted my intuition, my parents respected my choice, and I dropped out of karate. But the teacher just landed on another girl instead, and I never learned martial arts. Is that so much better?)

Perhaps we can blame my desire for adventure and independence as the reason why I have been exposed to so much shit. But fuck it, this is 2023 in Canada. I should be able to be adventurous and independent.

The same thing remains true now that used to be true 20 years ago, back when Sekhar and I met in our theater group, educating high school students on issues of interpersonal violence and sexual assault: People are asking the wrong question. They always want to know why the prey fall prey, instead of why the predators attack.

It’s because we want to otherize. Then we can say, “It wouldn’t happen to me.”

Well, I have been harassed or a witness to harassment in too many contexts for it to be just my fault. Swinger clubs and vacations, sure (even though again, no. It’s not okay, period). But also, my karate teacher. Also, our old homeschooling camp community (and here we thought we could protect our children by keeping them home). Also, on airplanes. Also, at Dance festivals. Also at work.

The list goes on and on.

This is a societal problem. It’s about imbalance. It’s about emotional immaturity and the havoc of the patriarchy. It’s about boys being taught to ignore their feelings with shows of bravado and bluster. It’s about girls being taught never to show their anger, that to be “good” is to be nice and liked at all costs.

We’re all the worse for it.

I’m tired of being scared. Of worrying who the next problem will be. And I’m tired of watching my friends focus their energy on the wrong goddamn things.

Fear takes up a lot of room.

Fuck fear, I’m going hiking.

In the middle of all that, Etienne texted me yesterday to let me know that Adriane would be there. At the Dance Festival.

Oh goody. Just what I need right now, I thought with an angry sob, throwing my phone onto the bed where I knew I wouldn’t actually damage it.

(I know that reaction will chip away at the Polyamory-is-great notion but I’ll build it back later.)

Just a day prior, Naomi had asked, “How do you manage not to get attached to people when they have other people in their lives?”

“Well…it’s not about not being attached. I do get attached,” I said.

“But how do you not get attached?” she asked. Did you hear what I just said?

“I do!” I said again. “Nobody said I don’t. I’m attached to many people. It’s more about managing the attachment and the feelings that come up.”

“But I just think, attachment is attachment and there’s no way to stop it.”

“Right. I agree. But I think you’re equating attachment with monogamous commitment. They can go together, but they don’t have to. Like, take Dee. She has a husband and a family and people who are really important to her. I know that, and I respect it. I’m not asking to take their place. I also know feelings can and will come up, and basically we’re all making the commitment to work through those feelings, together. In the meantime, I have to make sure that even if I feel attached, I’m not relying on her for things she can’t give me.” (i.e. Break Free of the Mommy Orbit.)

“Ooooh. Okay. I get it. So you do get attached, then.”

Double, triple “yes.”

“It’s not easy,” I added. “Feelings are real. You have to feel them. Jealousy in particular, which is the feeling we’ve been all taught to avoid at all costs. But the thing is, relationships aren’t easy, period. They all have their particular challenges. This is just the challenge that I’m choosing. Jealousy will come up, and I’m okay with that. Everyone else involved is okay with it too, and that’s the important thing. We’re choosing to love people who have other people in their lives.”

Gah gah.

Grace asked a similar question when we were at Lake George. Something about priorities and love, and how you make room for more than one person in your life.

“You can have multiple friends, can’t you?” was my reply. “Even multiple children. But you’re still able to make time for them and love them all, right?”

“Oh, yeah. You’re right. So basically, just the same way I make a coffee date with a friend, you do too. The only difference is that there may be more at play than coffee.”

Yes. Pretty much that.

So, yesterday, I got to practice what I was preaching. Oh, the feelings.

Will you still want to partner up with me at the workshop? Do I still kiss you? I was feeling iffy about coming for reasons you’ll see in our sensitive thread eventually. I got excited when you said you’d be there but now I feel nervous. Will we be introduced to each other or just side-eye each other awkwardly from across the room? How does she feel about meeting me?

In the end, I decided to go because I knew I’d be mad at myself if I stayed home out of fear from Clyde and feelings about Adriane. And actually, the whole Clyde thing made everything else less important.

Etienne replied and said we’d be doing different things from her at the festival anyway, that we may not end up interacting, and that Adriane was cool with seeing me but we should be sensitive about PDA.

Okay. I’ll follow your lead. I still want to come. It’s going to be awkward though. You ready for this, baby? We’re poly-ing for real, now…

He responded with a crunchy-face emoji, and added,

Tell me if you need anything in particular, okay? I want to make sure you feel comfortable. I love you.

I decided to finally listen to all his messages on our sensitive thread as I metroed to the festival. Now I’m all caught up on his gallivantings. He’s been having fun, and the honest truth is I’m happy for him.

Maybe one of these days I can start having fun like that, too.

Adriane was in a separate class the whole time so I never even saw her.

Sunday, June 18th, 2023:

I’m not at the festival right now. It was the overwhelming consensus that I stay the fuck home.

I hope Gale notices.

I’m not staying at home to make a point, though. That would be dumb. I’m just doing it because I feel good in my body right now and I’m almost better in my head, and I won’t be if I go back.

I just hope the point is also made.

The Bolton spa was SUCH a good idea yesterday.

We went for a walk in the rain, first. We followed this crooked little roundabout trail in the woods next to a lake. The fog hung heavy but every now and then it cleared, sparing us a glimpse of rolling hills and soooooooo much greenery. The forest was bursting with it, and mushrooms were sprouting up in all directions, too.

Lynn’s friend Paulette is really nice. I hadn’t realized that she works for UNICEF. The job she has is my literal dream job, my dream since I was 18.

Is it still my dream?

I’m not sure.

I quizzed her on the pros and cons of everything.

I think my new dream might be, Be a full-time hermit. Step into your writer self and never come back.

Lynn had been up until 2am the night before. She’s been crazy busy at work, and the stress was leaking out her eyeballs. On top of it, she decided to cook a mediterranean feast but got totally overwhelmed with logistics.

“And I was lying in bed this morning at 1am thinking, how am I going to find the time, and then I was like, okay, I know I could just buy the lunch, but I don’t want to be that friend, who cares more about work than anything else! Then it was raining, and I really thought we should change the time, but I knew Lorelai isn’t usually on her phone on Saturdays, and I felt so bad, imagining you waiting in the rain…”

“Oh my god Lynn! You sweet sweet friend! You do NOT have to carry our emotional burdens! Do you realize that in that scenario, you didn’t even let us go hungry?”

I said in a faux-mocking tone, “God, I would have complained so much if you had bought me lunch instead of cooking it! Lynn, it’s okay to be busy, as long as you plan for it in advance and forgive yourself, in advance, for letting a few things go.”

“It’s true,” she agreed. “At least this time I wasn’t running through the house trying to fold all my laundry. I was like, the laundry can wait!”

“Good! Yes, that! And seriously, if we were the kind of friends to put you down for buying us lunch, we would be shit friends. As for my phone, that’s my responsibility. It’s a risk I take, knowing I’m not looking at it, that plans might change. Plus, last night, when I saw it was going to rain all day, I decided to turn on Whatsapp and see what was going on. My emotional burden, not yours.”

Gah gah.

She did cook the mediterranean feast in the end, though, and it was fucking delicious. We ate it in this beautiful indoor/outdoor gazebo at Mount Orford, with views of the woods and the lake. I don’t think I’d ever seen such a fancy state park spot.

And because it was drizzling, we had the entire place to ourselves.

I had made an extra challah. Lauren had made falafel. (Paulette was visiting from out of town so that was her contribution.) Then came Lynn’s dishes: She had done something spectacular to an eggplant, made a bunch of yogurt-dill type sauces, plus some kind of salted lemon jelly and a pepper-pomegranate dish.

Amazing.

Now I think they may come over for brunch, but I’m not sure, so I have Whatsapp open on my computer. I’m not on my phone, though. Fuck my phone.

Okay, they’re coming. I’m going to stop writing soon, put a mouthful of breakfast in my belly, and then prepare for brunch.

My heart hurts.

Later that day:

I impulse-purchased an orchid. It’s beautiful. Bright purple, obviously.

I thought it was my first orchid, until I remembered it wasn’t. As least, I don’t think. I feel like somebody gave Sekhar and me an orchid once, but the flowers died and never came back.

I decided that even if that happens to this one, I don’t care. I do hope it will be a forever-orchid, though. It’s so pretty.

Lynn and Paulette were here (that’s why I went shopping in the first place — to replenish our cocktail ingredients) and luckily Paulette knew all the things about orchids so now I know how to take care of it.

The brunch was exactly what I needed; I was happy to be cooking pancakes instead of dealing with fuckfaces. The rage is still bubbling, though. I just allowed myself to feel annoyed at the price tag for the missed day, too. I had already known I wouldn’t attend the whole thing (I bought a week-long pass) but if it hadn’t been for Mysognists Running The World I likely would have attended today, so that’s however many dollars down the toilet.

(Eew. $100. I just calculated.)

I don’t want to ask Gale for my money back, though. That just feels like it’s missing the point.

I’ll add it to my Idiot Tax. That’s where I record wasted money so that I don’t have to carry around the annoyance with me. The list lives on my wall, where the various items (spoiled food, terrible rice cooker, lost day at festival, etc) can feel vindicated, instead.

She has responded, I know that much. I did some Moat Management today, and her message is in there. I’ll wait to check on the moat until I feel like I’m strong enough to handle it, which probably means when Mommy is around. She has the habit of making me feel strong enough to own my truth and dance while doing it. So I’ll save Moat Stuff for Mommy.

Once I had sorted through my messages, I lowered a couple of drawbridges.

First, I called Dad. It is Father’s Day, after all.

He did the same thing he always does when I call him, which is launch into a monologue about the weather and the events of the day. Somebody must have taught him, once upon a time, that that’s how you have a phone call, and it is always how he has a phone call. Once he runs out of random updates he goes, “Okay, so…” and you know the call is over.

This time, though, I asked him what kind of Zen stuff he was reading. That got him and he actually joined the conversation.

He’s reading D.T. Suzuki, and I’m supposed to check him out.

In the car yesterday, I asked the ladies if I could have a quick rant. The anger is just bubbling and I needed to let it out.

But then I didn’t know what to say.

Where to even start?

“I really don’t know how to make a long story short,” I said. “But I don’t want it to be long.”

“Ten words or fewer!” prompted Lauren.

Oh, I can rise to the challenge!

“International Dance Festival,” I began. I could see Lauren count to three on her fingers.

“Known. Multiple. Inappropriate-touch offender,” I continued. Lauren reached to eight and the rest of my audience groaned.

“Wandering around free!” I finished.

“Eleven!” said Lauren. We agreed we could lose the final preposition.

The fucked up thing was that everyone had a story.

“So, I used to do Blues dance,” said Lauren.

“Oh, cool!” I don’t know a lot about Lauren but every time I see her she makes me smile. She’s Lynn’s friend, but we keep seeing each other, and I think I’ve now committed to going canoe camping with them this summer! Eek!

“Yeah so they had a committee for that sort of thing. And I filed a complaint.”

“Oh really? How cool!”

“Well…” The car groaned again.

Long story short, Lauren filed the complaint about the creepster. The members of the committee had confronted said creepster.

Creepster then wrote a defensive, angry, threatening letter to the commitee.

Committee then…got scared and told Lauren they couldn’t help her.

!!!!!!

“I’m sorry to disappoint you,” said Lauren. “I know you were hoping for a happy ending.”

“No, this is good,” I said starkly. “Thank you for giving me fuel for my fire.”

Lynn had stories about improv dance, too. Same fucking thing. She doesn’t do it anymore, because of the creeps.

All these amazing art forms, that are being ruined by fucking assholes.

And of course it’s not just dance. It’s everywhere.

Paulette knew a woman, a first year teacher, who exposed her school’s principle for feeling her up while she was in her probationary period. (He had told her that he’d been busy and that they should meet after school. Then when she went to his office, he closed the door and…bammo.)

It turned out he was doing it to all the other first year teachers too.

Fucking power-hungry horrible fucking people.

Oh, the rage.

While my drawbridges were down, I called my aunt. She was out on a walk, and I could hear the sounds around her and the exertion in her voice.

“So what’s new with you?” she asked.

I didn’t even think about it. I hadn’t meant to call and rant to her, too, but…

“I’m so fucking tired of the patriarchy,” I said to her.

“Oh yeah,” she said. “It’s a man’s world out there. But did someone do something to you? Is somebody stalking you or something?” she sounded worried and I felt bad for alarming her.

“Oh, it’s okay. You don’t have to be concerned for my safety or anything. I’m safer now than I’ve ever been, actually,” I spoke slowly, processing the thought as I said it out loud. I paused, considering.

“I’m just also more aware than I’ve ever been, and it’s making me angry,” I said. “It’s just all these little things, that keep adding up over time, and a few really big ones too, and I just…”

And that’s when she told me about when she lived in New York City, how the catcalls were so terrible she had to cross to the other side of the street.

“I remember feeling just dirty, and scared, and…bad,” she said. “And then…a few years later, I was down in Central Park, going for a run. And a man came out in front of me, and started masturbating.”

“The rage, Aunty! I feel the rage!” I exclaimed.

“I know, I know. But try not to let it color everything. There are still so many nice things in the world.”

“Oh, I won’t. But I will channel it. I’m going to deposit it all somewhere. I’m going to write about it, and the world will listen!” I proclaimed, and she laughed at me because I probably sounded nuts.

I’m not nuts, though.

I’m very, very sane.

As if the universe were just checking on me to make sure I’d learned today’s lesson…this happened.

I was leaving the yoga studio because I needed to rage cry. (I still do, actually. It will probably come out when I’m with Mommy this week, but a couple tears managed to pop out on their own right at the end of yoga, all by myself.)

So anyway, I didn’t stay for meditation because I needed to cry and orgasm (neither of which I’ve done yet — I ended up eating and talking to people on the phone) and you can’t really do that during a group sit.

I turned left and headed up the street.

Incidentally, I like to smile at people and not just pretend they don’t exist, but it’s such a calculation you have to make. Walking down the street in a city isn’t easy.

I avoided making eye contact with one particular man.

As I passed him, he stepped forward, right at me. My heart and my legs picked up the pace.

He leered at me, lecherously.

“Nice,” he said, almost hissing while he undressed me with his eyes. Like I was for sale, or something. I was grateful to be out in public with many witnesses.

Once I was a few feet away from him, my anger overcame my fear.

I turned around and said sternly in French, “You are THREATENING when you do that. It is scary. Please stop.”

He had the presence of mind to look stricken.

It took a couple of blocks before my heart calmed down.

What a world.

The same day Naomi asked me about attachment and jealousy, I told her about my tiny home, the one I’ve rented in the woods this July.

I’m so excited. It’s calling to me. I mean, this is my wrapping-up phase for Super Boss Bitch, but come July, I’m going Full Lorelai on the world. I can feel it in my bones.

“You’re going to be in the woods alone? Is the owner going to be around, at least?” she asked.

“I think he will be,” I said. I had actually been a bit nervous when I saw the owner was a man. I had thought he was a woman from the photograph, but then I looked closer and realized that what I’d thought was “Francine” was actually a feminine-looking François. Anyway. Who knows, who cares. All genders have their weirdos.

“Okay good. Just because, you know, a woman alone in the woods? What if some creepy guy came after you?”

“I’ve had my share of city creeps,” I retorted. “I’ll take my chances with the country ones.” (And that was before today’s street dickwad.)

I thought but didn’t add, I’m not actually sure whether it’s safer to have the owner around or not. What’s guaranteeing s/he’s not a lech, too?

So, in other news, I’ve been thinking about what I wrote about orbits, and how silly it was for me to say that the Gale orbit had “stopped.”

It most certainly hasn’t stopped. I just experienced an entire rotation of the Gale Orbit. It started on Monday morning when I arrived at her festival to find that she had done nothing very special with that Letter to the Community I had written at her request. Then it ended…well actually, I wanted to say it ended today, but if I’m being honest the orbit is still happening. I’ve calmed it, but I’m still thinking way too much about her.

I think the thing about orbits is that they’re affected by gravitational pull.

I have the tendency to fall into other peoples’ gravitational pulls.

I even did it last week, in Portland. The whole time I was staying at Patrick’s, I cared way too hard what he thought, and I could feel myself trying to shift myself to be the person I thought he wanted me to be.

And he’s not even a love interest!

Neither is Gale.

The thing is, I think orbits are inevitable in relationships of all kinds. The trick is to manage the pull. When you do that, you can be the fullest expression of yourself while still helping lift up the other person.

I wish I could ignore the data, but Gale is really not lifting me up right now. :(

(Mommy would say me proclaiming the orbit to have stopped is an example of me thinking in extremes; my orbits aren’t going to stop. But they will slow, and I will learn to manage them, and always always make sure that my primary universe is my own. I’m getting closer all the time, and that’s what I meant when I wrote those things. No, my Gale orbit hasn’t stopped in its tracks, but I’ve made gigantic leaps and bounds when it comes to living my truth instead of hers.)

(Patrick said he does the extremist thinking thing, too. “Black and white thinking! I’m working on stopping that!” he said. “My therapist taught me about it.”)

Two perfect quotes from our spa day with the girls:

• Lauren, as the sun had set and we ate a quick dinner in the darkened parking lot before driving home to Montreal: “Aww! It’s bedtime for nature!”
• Lynn, while breathing in the beauty of the chilled river plunge, the wooded hot tubs and the eucalyptus saunas of the Bolton Spa: “This is so much better than hyperventilating in bed!”

And that…pretty much sums up my life.

Love,

Lorelai

PS While I had my drawbridges lowered, I asked Joseph if he would tell our dad what his father’s day gift is.

Would you? I think I overdid my Noom enthusiasm on the group thread.

Our Father’s Day “gift,” which is actually a badly disguised blatant attempt at getting him to exercise by gifting him Noom, the app that has apparently helped Joseph get back in shape. When I agreed to it, I figured the “gift” might somehow appeal to his addictive brain and get him to move. I told my brothers we should throw in a prize to the spa after his first three months so that part of our gift was actually a gift.

Not it. I’ll get Isaac to do it. But you should call Dad! He counts how many children have called him on Father’s Day…

I texted my electrical engineer of a genius little brother who likely doesn’t even know what day it is.

I tried and failed to get ahold of Mistress (who is visiting in July! Maybe. Don’t hold your breath. This will be our sixth attempt) and Alba (oh, beautiful Alba. I hope I see you again.)

Then, I turned off my goddamn phone.

One day, I swear to god, I’m throwing it in the ocean and I won’t miss it one bit.

Except that it’s really expensive so I may as well sell it if it comes to that.

Either way, I’ll keep you posted.