You get to that point, the mid-twenties, and it's time to do things for yourself instead of getting your Dad/boyfriend/random guy walking by on the street to do your manly stuff for you. Also, you're a feminist, right? So put on your big girl pants (Shoshanna-style) and just deal with it yourself.
So I get home, and the smoke detector is beeping. Not continuously, but frequently enough to slowly drive you mad. You might not be grown-up enough to replace the battery, but at least you can stop that damn noise so you can get some work done. Future You can worry about the consequences.
Step 1: Reach up and try to pull the battery out.
Step 2: Get a stool and repeat Step 1.
Step 3: Get frustrated at negotiating angles and pull the damn thing off the wall, mangling it slightly in the process.
Step 4: Pull the battery out. Success... right?
Step 5: Wait for the beep. When it's not forthcoming, walk away, job's right.
Step 6: Just as you are leaving the room, hear the beep again. Damn thing.
Step 7: Read the instructions on the back. Apparently it will keep beeping every minute until you feed it.
Step 8: Look closely. The problem is that the battery is physically out of the machine but still connected to the wires.
Step 9: Try to disconnect it from the wires. Fail.
Step 10: Go to the linen closest, pull out the biggest towel there, wrap the damn thing in it and stuff it in a cupboard on the other side of the house to where you hang out.
Job's right.
Sunday, May 19, 2013
Thursday, May 9, 2013
Don't Tell the Gen Y Police: I Hate Travelling
Last night I had a dream I was wandering around Chicago. I'd had plans but they fell through. So I went to this shop called Frenchies that I read about in Will Grayson, Will Grayson and then I wandered around looking for the bean, because that is the only other thing I know about Chicago. I found some strangers and we wandered around in a mob, and then I tried to call my friend Catherine*, who lives in Upstate New York. I was just going to head back to Australia, but I thought, I haven't seen Catherine in like six years, I might as well try to see her. Maybe I can get a flight to New York State.
Why haven't I seen Catherine in six years? Well, I haven't travelled. Both my sisters have been back to America, where we all lived in 2007, but I haven't been overseas at all since then.
I could say it's because I've been poor, and that's true. There was a period in which I was never going anywhere further from Melbourne than my hometown, to visit my parents. I couldn't afford to go anywhere. But then in 2011 I went to Arnhem Land, and ever since then I've been saving for the next trip.
I studied Spanish in uni, so people used to ask me a lot, and they still ask me sometimes, "So have you ever been to Spain/South America/Spanish-speaking place?" and I would hang my head in shame.
But here is my dirty secret: I hate travelling. I love being in other places, and learning about how other people live and ra ra ra, but I hate the literal process of getting from one place to another. This is why I loved living in America for a year, in the one small town, and taking maybe three trips to other parts of America.
When I hear about people travelling around America or Europe, I get exhausted just listening. Once, my cousin went to Europe with her husband. She came back and we caught up, she told me all the places she went. I was tallying them up in my head, and I was thinking, "Hmm, she must have been gone for at least four months to go to all those places." But when I asked her how long she was gone, she said "Three weeks." And my brain exploded.
I don't understand it. Because if you go to so many places, you spend most of your time travelling. Every day is a travel day. Some people love that, are exhilarated by that. I hate it, hate it. I'll make the effort of having one travel day, and then I'll have to spend a week staying in the one place just to recover.
It seems obvious to me why travelling is so stressful, but this is an Asperger's Explanation Blog, so I'll Explain it.
1) Things can change. It happens all the time. Flights are delayed, or cancelled altogether. The fear of this change is as scary, or worse, than when it actually happens.
2) Processing information. People with Asperger's aren't as good at filtering information. If I go to a new place, my brain takes in every single detail. It's not a useful skill -- I can't remember all the details -- but I just have to process it all. So if I went to ten countries in two weeks, I would spend all of my time stressing about a train/plane getting delayed and then all of my time getting sensory overload from all the new information. Urgh, I'm getting stressed just thinking about it. Nobody has that much time to spend stressing.
So I think the reason I had this dream that I was stuck in Chicago last night, is that I'm going to be travelling soon, and I'm getting prepared for it. I'm going back to Arnhem Land in three weeks, for a few weeks. There are the usual uncertainties of flying, but I'm getting better at controlling my nerves over the travelling process. And I'll be going to all places I've been before, so I don't have to spend lots of time wondering what it will look like. (Although I've been told the community has changed a lot in the five months since I left.) It's still stressful, but I'm nowhere near as stressed about the prospect as I would have been, say, a year ago.
Win for Emmeline.
*I don't know if I've talked about her before in this blog so it's a new psuedonym and to be honest a pretty lazy one.
Why haven't I seen Catherine in six years? Well, I haven't travelled. Both my sisters have been back to America, where we all lived in 2007, but I haven't been overseas at all since then.
I could say it's because I've been poor, and that's true. There was a period in which I was never going anywhere further from Melbourne than my hometown, to visit my parents. I couldn't afford to go anywhere. But then in 2011 I went to Arnhem Land, and ever since then I've been saving for the next trip.
I studied Spanish in uni, so people used to ask me a lot, and they still ask me sometimes, "So have you ever been to Spain/South America/Spanish-speaking place?" and I would hang my head in shame.
But here is my dirty secret: I hate travelling. I love being in other places, and learning about how other people live and ra ra ra, but I hate the literal process of getting from one place to another. This is why I loved living in America for a year, in the one small town, and taking maybe three trips to other parts of America.
When I hear about people travelling around America or Europe, I get exhausted just listening. Once, my cousin went to Europe with her husband. She came back and we caught up, she told me all the places she went. I was tallying them up in my head, and I was thinking, "Hmm, she must have been gone for at least four months to go to all those places." But when I asked her how long she was gone, she said "Three weeks." And my brain exploded.
I don't understand it. Because if you go to so many places, you spend most of your time travelling. Every day is a travel day. Some people love that, are exhilarated by that. I hate it, hate it. I'll make the effort of having one travel day, and then I'll have to spend a week staying in the one place just to recover.
It seems obvious to me why travelling is so stressful, but this is an Asperger's Explanation Blog, so I'll Explain it.
1) Things can change. It happens all the time. Flights are delayed, or cancelled altogether. The fear of this change is as scary, or worse, than when it actually happens.
2) Processing information. People with Asperger's aren't as good at filtering information. If I go to a new place, my brain takes in every single detail. It's not a useful skill -- I can't remember all the details -- but I just have to process it all. So if I went to ten countries in two weeks, I would spend all of my time stressing about a train/plane getting delayed and then all of my time getting sensory overload from all the new information. Urgh, I'm getting stressed just thinking about it. Nobody has that much time to spend stressing.
So I think the reason I had this dream that I was stuck in Chicago last night, is that I'm going to be travelling soon, and I'm getting prepared for it. I'm going back to Arnhem Land in three weeks, for a few weeks. There are the usual uncertainties of flying, but I'm getting better at controlling my nerves over the travelling process. And I'll be going to all places I've been before, so I don't have to spend lots of time wondering what it will look like. (Although I've been told the community has changed a lot in the five months since I left.) It's still stressful, but I'm nowhere near as stressed about the prospect as I would have been, say, a year ago.
Win for Emmeline.
*I don't know if I've talked about her before in this blog so it's a new psuedonym and to be honest a pretty lazy one.
Monday, May 6, 2013
Thursday, March 7, 2013
Happy International Women's Day
Today is the .27% of the year that we acknowledge 50% of the population. I was at an International Women's Day breakfast event on Tuesday and one of the markers the speaker gave of the disparity between men and women was about how only a few CEOs of the top companies in Australia are women.
These kind of statistics are often trotted out at occasions like this and I am troubled by their focus. Sure it is a good example of the fact that fewer women than men are in positions of power and the glass ceiling of women's success. The problem is that it implies a very limited view of success. Are we judging women by traditional patriarchal models of success? It goes back to the sexist idea that women and men having equal rights and privileges translates as women reaching the 'superior' state of being a man. It also ignores intersectionality, implying that all women have equal privilege and all men have equal privilege.
The question should not be "how can we get women to reach the same level as men?" but rather, "what do women want, and what can we change to help them get it?"
Of course Freud (and Mel Gibson's) famous question of what women want is inherently sexist, and also sorry Mel but no the answer is not to sleep with you, contrary to your movie. The reason this question is sexist is it once again homogeneises a large, diverse group of people.
Instead I'll ask a question I can more readily answer, in hope that it resonates with other women: "What does this woman want?"
Career-wise, I want a lot of different things. To run a wool store, be a linguist, a writer, an academic. When I think about being any of those things, I don't worry about a glass ceiling getting in the way of my success. My gender issue lies outside the traditional career trajectory, because it is outside it.
My problem is that I also want to be a mother. Middle class and upper middle class women have only been working mothers for a couple of generations. It was only my grandmothers' generation that women working for the public service were obliged to give up their jobs upon marriage. My mother was and is a working mother. I think she does a good job of it. But she works for a women's organisation, and they're pretty flexible, and most of the people working there are working mothers. I think she keeps a good balance. Before her current job, when we were young, she worked with my Dad on a family business. This business allowed them to both be home a lot, or to keep sick children under a desk when necessary (this is not a joke, I have fond memories of being wrapped up in a pillow fort under a desk at my parents' business and spending the day reading a book).
This is something I worry about. What job can I do that will also allow me to raise children? Would I be able to find a babydaddy willing to share the burden of primary caregiver like my own Daddy was to an extent?
I feel like men don't worry about these things as much. Whenever I encounter discourse about working fathers, it's more of a Cat's in the Cradle kind of guilt rather than Oh God who is going to do all the (unpaid, domestic) work.
Nannying I don't really see as a solution here. I find it incredibly problematic. I can't even begin to explain how. But apart from being problematic, why would I want someone else to raise my children?
I guess my problem is I want to "have it all", but I don't want to do it all. It seems like another one of life's unanswerable questions. It is a knot of feminism that I feel is more widespread and troubling than a dearth of female CEOs.
I don't have any more answers. I welcome your suggestions/ideas/comments!
These kind of statistics are often trotted out at occasions like this and I am troubled by their focus. Sure it is a good example of the fact that fewer women than men are in positions of power and the glass ceiling of women's success. The problem is that it implies a very limited view of success. Are we judging women by traditional patriarchal models of success? It goes back to the sexist idea that women and men having equal rights and privileges translates as women reaching the 'superior' state of being a man. It also ignores intersectionality, implying that all women have equal privilege and all men have equal privilege.
The question should not be "how can we get women to reach the same level as men?" but rather, "what do women want, and what can we change to help them get it?"
Of course Freud (and Mel Gibson's) famous question of what women want is inherently sexist, and also sorry Mel but no the answer is not to sleep with you, contrary to your movie. The reason this question is sexist is it once again homogeneises a large, diverse group of people.
Instead I'll ask a question I can more readily answer, in hope that it resonates with other women: "What does this woman want?"
Career-wise, I want a lot of different things. To run a wool store, be a linguist, a writer, an academic. When I think about being any of those things, I don't worry about a glass ceiling getting in the way of my success. My gender issue lies outside the traditional career trajectory, because it is outside it.
My problem is that I also want to be a mother. Middle class and upper middle class women have only been working mothers for a couple of generations. It was only my grandmothers' generation that women working for the public service were obliged to give up their jobs upon marriage. My mother was and is a working mother. I think she does a good job of it. But she works for a women's organisation, and they're pretty flexible, and most of the people working there are working mothers. I think she keeps a good balance. Before her current job, when we were young, she worked with my Dad on a family business. This business allowed them to both be home a lot, or to keep sick children under a desk when necessary (this is not a joke, I have fond memories of being wrapped up in a pillow fort under a desk at my parents' business and spending the day reading a book).
This is something I worry about. What job can I do that will also allow me to raise children? Would I be able to find a babydaddy willing to share the burden of primary caregiver like my own Daddy was to an extent?
I feel like men don't worry about these things as much. Whenever I encounter discourse about working fathers, it's more of a Cat's in the Cradle kind of guilt rather than Oh God who is going to do all the (unpaid, domestic) work.
Nannying I don't really see as a solution here. I find it incredibly problematic. I can't even begin to explain how. But apart from being problematic, why would I want someone else to raise my children?
I guess my problem is I want to "have it all", but I don't want to do it all. It seems like another one of life's unanswerable questions. It is a knot of feminism that I feel is more widespread and troubling than a dearth of female CEOs.
I don't have any more answers. I welcome your suggestions/ideas/comments!
Lifestyles of the Rich and Very Famous
I wanted to say that I haven't been doing anything exciting, that if I were to blog it would be just moaning about how I can't get my life together. But that's a lie. In the past two months I've been doing heaps of awesome stuff. So maybe I'll briefly catch you up on that. Then I'll get to the bitching and moaning.
I went on a one-day road trip with Melacha (he needs a new pseudonym) and worked out my biceps doing about 100 U-turns because he's a bit useless with directions ("go this way, yes that's it, oh no turn around, go on, oh actually no the original way was the right one!"). The car I was driving does not have power steering. Other things that happened on the road trip: Melacha ate life changing ratatouille; I bought chutney from a very effective saleswoman who was, as Melacha put it, "aggressively gentle". With every breath she used a different pet name for us. She had us in and out in under ten minutes. We burst out of the shop reeling from her affection.
I had a holiday with Forceful Consent, who also needs a new pseudonym. We went camping which was awesome. I hadn't been camping in a long time despite the fact that people had been promising to take me for months. The highlight was seeing a little echidna. So adorbs. I can't describe how cute that was.
I went to Canberra last weekend and spent time with my Canberra friends, a bunch of my Yolngu family from Arnhem Land, my friend Sally from Arnhem Land, and a multitude of Lacie (my 57-year-old famous artist daughter) fan-girls. I was at Selling Yarns 3 conference, and it was awesome, a total mind-blast. Lots of creative energy and things to think about. I had a great time hanging out, but my poor Yolngu peeps were very, very cold. Canberra had *apparently* been experiencing normal summer weather, but just for the weekend decided to put on a show of weather more suited to mid-July, in honour of all the people visiting from warmer climes.
But all this isn't what I actually sat down to write. That's always the way, amirite?
This is kind of an Asperger's blog. Well let me tell you something that is really important for people with Asperger's: Being Settled. Having a place where you can put all your things, and having a place to go every day. A routine, a purpose. Maybe these are things everyone wants or needs for equilibrium But I do know that my Asperger's makes this Really Important for me.
To be fair, I do have a place and a routine, to an extent. I'm living with my parents, but to his credit my Dad has stopped "jokingly" asking me when I'm planning to get my own place. I have my own room here, even though it's too small to ever get properly organised. And I have writing projects that I work on every day, alongside house- and job-hunting.
In the style of Jane Austen heroines, I am trying to exert myself. Instead of throwing myself on my bed in fits of despair, Marianne-style, I am putting in the effort to retain decorum and composure, and just get on with it. Like a good Elinor.
But there are times when my ability to exert myself is severely tested. In four days I have applied for eleven houses on gumtree. Yes, ELEVEN. Guess how many replies I've got? One. And that was so say, "sorry this room has been filled k bye".
Am I doing something wrong? Is there a magical combination of words I can use to relay the message: "Meet me, I'm good company and not a slob"? Lots of people say I'm a joy to live with. Here's an idea: Maybe I should put past sharehouse references in my emails. Is that weird?
This is my dream: I would love to have my own place. Like a one-bedroom apartment with a corner in the lounge room for me to write. I could deck it out in the style that I like (let's be honest, it would involve crochet blankets draped on anything drapable) and I wouldn't have to move house all the time, and I would have a place to store stuff so my parents could stop threatening to set my boxes on fire.
But I don't live in dream-land. I live in the Real World, and in this world I spent the last five years studying, an activity that puts you in debt rather than accruing you the kind of capital you need for real estate. I wasn't saving money. I was bettering myself and my employment prospects.
Sorry, what was that? Yes, that's a nice segue into the next thing I'm feeling disheartened about: my employment prospects. Okay well first of all, I'm on unemployment benefits, which is bad enough. I didn't mind getting money from the government to study, but this is different. Here's where my snobbery comes in: I think it's really important for there to be a security net for people out of work, I just don't think I should be on it.
So as part of this free money, I had to attend a local employment service yesterday. The one good thing that happened was I discovered I only have to apply for four jobs a fortnight. Everything else was bad. The whole experience was so humiliating. The woman who saw me was kind and friendly, but also ignorant, wrapped up in paperwork and incredibly unhelpful.
We got off on the wrong foot. She asked me where I last worked.
Me: [Insert community name here] Arts Centre
Her: Is that here in town?
Me: Um, no it's in Arnhem Land.
Her: Oh, so how long have you been back in Australia?
Me: *Headdesk*... It is in Australia.
This woman's good news for me was that because I have a disability, they have some extra funding for me. So they can pay for a short course, to make me more employable!
Her: Have you got your RSA? Maybe you can get a job in hospitality!
Me: I can't work in hospitality.
Her: Why not?
Me: I have Asperger's. (She knows this by the way. It's on the form.)
Her: Now can you explain to me what Asperger's is? Is it like when you have trouble writing essays? Like you can't put it together?
Me: *Headdesk*
I never actually did *headdesk*. I explained to her what Asperger's is, which is actually not my job. If I had *headdesked* every time I was inclined to during the meeting, I would have got a concussion.
Here's the thing: I did not graduate from Melbourne Uni to get a job at a fucking bar. It's not like I want to be a high-powered executive (see future blog post) but I want a career, of sorts. I want a job that is meaningful, a job that I can actually do and feel good about.
This system is flawed. The fact that they were treating me like a no-hoper made me feel like a no-hoper. Instead of being desperate to palm me off onto any employer who would have me (the extra funding actually covers paying an employer to "give me a go", her words. Does it get any more humiliating than that??) why didn't they ask some meaningful questions? Here are some: "What is your dream job? Where do you want to be? What are you passionate about? What are you into? What are your skills?" If they had asked some questions like that, then we might have got somewhere.
Screw you, employment agency that I will not name. You're fired.
I went on a one-day road trip with Melacha (he needs a new pseudonym) and worked out my biceps doing about 100 U-turns because he's a bit useless with directions ("go this way, yes that's it, oh no turn around, go on, oh actually no the original way was the right one!"). The car I was driving does not have power steering. Other things that happened on the road trip: Melacha ate life changing ratatouille; I bought chutney from a very effective saleswoman who was, as Melacha put it, "aggressively gentle". With every breath she used a different pet name for us. She had us in and out in under ten minutes. We burst out of the shop reeling from her affection.
I had a holiday with Forceful Consent, who also needs a new pseudonym. We went camping which was awesome. I hadn't been camping in a long time despite the fact that people had been promising to take me for months. The highlight was seeing a little echidna. So adorbs. I can't describe how cute that was.
I went to Canberra last weekend and spent time with my Canberra friends, a bunch of my Yolngu family from Arnhem Land, my friend Sally from Arnhem Land, and a multitude of Lacie (my 57-year-old famous artist daughter) fan-girls. I was at Selling Yarns 3 conference, and it was awesome, a total mind-blast. Lots of creative energy and things to think about. I had a great time hanging out, but my poor Yolngu peeps were very, very cold. Canberra had *apparently* been experiencing normal summer weather, but just for the weekend decided to put on a show of weather more suited to mid-July, in honour of all the people visiting from warmer climes.
But all this isn't what I actually sat down to write. That's always the way, amirite?
This is kind of an Asperger's blog. Well let me tell you something that is really important for people with Asperger's: Being Settled. Having a place where you can put all your things, and having a place to go every day. A routine, a purpose. Maybe these are things everyone wants or needs for equilibrium But I do know that my Asperger's makes this Really Important for me.
To be fair, I do have a place and a routine, to an extent. I'm living with my parents, but to his credit my Dad has stopped "jokingly" asking me when I'm planning to get my own place. I have my own room here, even though it's too small to ever get properly organised. And I have writing projects that I work on every day, alongside house- and job-hunting.
In the style of Jane Austen heroines, I am trying to exert myself. Instead of throwing myself on my bed in fits of despair, Marianne-style, I am putting in the effort to retain decorum and composure, and just get on with it. Like a good Elinor.
But there are times when my ability to exert myself is severely tested. In four days I have applied for eleven houses on gumtree. Yes, ELEVEN. Guess how many replies I've got? One. And that was so say, "sorry this room has been filled k bye".
Am I doing something wrong? Is there a magical combination of words I can use to relay the message: "Meet me, I'm good company and not a slob"? Lots of people say I'm a joy to live with. Here's an idea: Maybe I should put past sharehouse references in my emails. Is that weird?
This is my dream: I would love to have my own place. Like a one-bedroom apartment with a corner in the lounge room for me to write. I could deck it out in the style that I like (let's be honest, it would involve crochet blankets draped on anything drapable) and I wouldn't have to move house all the time, and I would have a place to store stuff so my parents could stop threatening to set my boxes on fire.
But I don't live in dream-land. I live in the Real World, and in this world I spent the last five years studying, an activity that puts you in debt rather than accruing you the kind of capital you need for real estate. I wasn't saving money. I was bettering myself and my employment prospects.
Sorry, what was that? Yes, that's a nice segue into the next thing I'm feeling disheartened about: my employment prospects. Okay well first of all, I'm on unemployment benefits, which is bad enough. I didn't mind getting money from the government to study, but this is different. Here's where my snobbery comes in: I think it's really important for there to be a security net for people out of work, I just don't think I should be on it.
So as part of this free money, I had to attend a local employment service yesterday. The one good thing that happened was I discovered I only have to apply for four jobs a fortnight. Everything else was bad. The whole experience was so humiliating. The woman who saw me was kind and friendly, but also ignorant, wrapped up in paperwork and incredibly unhelpful.
We got off on the wrong foot. She asked me where I last worked.
Me: [Insert community name here] Arts Centre
Her: Is that here in town?
Me: Um, no it's in Arnhem Land.
Her: Oh, so how long have you been back in Australia?
Me: *Headdesk*... It is in Australia.
This woman's good news for me was that because I have a disability, they have some extra funding for me. So they can pay for a short course, to make me more employable!
Her: Have you got your RSA? Maybe you can get a job in hospitality!
Me: I can't work in hospitality.
Her: Why not?
Me: I have Asperger's. (She knows this by the way. It's on the form.)
Her: Now can you explain to me what Asperger's is? Is it like when you have trouble writing essays? Like you can't put it together?
Me: *Headdesk*
I never actually did *headdesk*. I explained to her what Asperger's is, which is actually not my job. If I had *headdesked* every time I was inclined to during the meeting, I would have got a concussion.
Here's the thing: I did not graduate from Melbourne Uni to get a job at a fucking bar. It's not like I want to be a high-powered executive (see future blog post) but I want a career, of sorts. I want a job that is meaningful, a job that I can actually do and feel good about.
This system is flawed. The fact that they were treating me like a no-hoper made me feel like a no-hoper. Instead of being desperate to palm me off onto any employer who would have me (the extra funding actually covers paying an employer to "give me a go", her words. Does it get any more humiliating than that??) why didn't they ask some meaningful questions? Here are some: "What is your dream job? Where do you want to be? What are you passionate about? What are you into? What are your skills?" If they had asked some questions like that, then we might have got somewhere.
Screw you, employment agency that I will not name. You're fired.
Thursday, January 31, 2013
Am I not Casey Chambers?
Another day, another hope that one day I'll get paid a dollar for what I'm doing.
I've been doing pretty well at editing and writing every weekday. I am almost finished on the first edit of my first YA novel, and the sequel is up to 17,000 words. I have condensed all the advice about being a writer that I have ever ingested, and it boils down to: Write. And Read. And that's what I've been doing.
A couple of people other than myself have read the first book. And they really like it. As I've reading over it while editing it, I like it. But here's the thing. It just seems so meaningless. Nothing much happens. When I was writing it, I felt like I was addressing very real and unattended issues about Christian teenagers. But now it just seems unimportant. Do I even have a plot? Should I throw a mass-murderer or a pregnancy in there to give my story some meat?
I'm aware my despondence is mostly emotional, rather than a reflection of the value of what I'm doing. I am probably only feeling this way because I have been going to bed too late, struggling to get out of bed and get ready, and not starting working until after 10am.
Existential crises only come along when my routine is broken. When I'm in bed by 10, asleep by 10:30, and working by 9am, the universe goes along unanalysed, undaunting. I just get along with it.
Which is what I should just go and do now.
I've been doing pretty well at editing and writing every weekday. I am almost finished on the first edit of my first YA novel, and the sequel is up to 17,000 words. I have condensed all the advice about being a writer that I have ever ingested, and it boils down to: Write. And Read. And that's what I've been doing.
A couple of people other than myself have read the first book. And they really like it. As I've reading over it while editing it, I like it. But here's the thing. It just seems so meaningless. Nothing much happens. When I was writing it, I felt like I was addressing very real and unattended issues about Christian teenagers. But now it just seems unimportant. Do I even have a plot? Should I throw a mass-murderer or a pregnancy in there to give my story some meat?
I'm aware my despondence is mostly emotional, rather than a reflection of the value of what I'm doing. I am probably only feeling this way because I have been going to bed too late, struggling to get out of bed and get ready, and not starting working until after 10am.
Existential crises only come along when my routine is broken. When I'm in bed by 10, asleep by 10:30, and working by 9am, the universe goes along unanalysed, undaunting. I just get along with it.
Which is what I should just go and do now.
Wednesday, January 23, 2013
Should we take Schrodinger's Rapist seriously?
Trigger warning: stalking/rape-fear. Spoiler alert: watch the episode first if
you intend to watch it.
Season 2 Episode 2 of GIRLS, "I Get Ideas" has a lot
of interesting aspects, and is genuinely funny. There is just one scene I want
to discuss here.
First, some background. At the end of season one Hannah is dating
Adam, whom the show has established is a massive douche, for various reasons.
He wants to move in together, she doesn't want the commitment, and they have a
fight then he gets hit by a bus*.
Opening season two episode one, we discover that Adam being
hit by a bus is somehow Hannah's fault? Because she feels obliged to be his
fulltime carer, even though she's having sex with another dude and also Adam is
being even more of an asshole than usual and making her feel constantly guilty.
At the end of episode one, Hannah tells him that it's over and doesn't want to
see him at all anymore. Adam makes it clear he's not happy with this, and
Hannah gets her (limited) empowerment on and says the equivalent of "tough
cookies"**.
This brings us to episode two***. Adam sends Hannah videos
of himself playing a song he has written for her. A snapshot of the
lyrics: “Standing outside/ Not making a sound/ Creeping around/ You
destroyed my heart/ Thanks.” Hannah watches this with her housemate,
commenting, "I always thought he was murdery in a sexy way, but what if
he's murdery in a murdery way?"
Later, Hannah is sitting in bed watching how to cut your own bangs on youtube. She is just about to give it a go when she gets a text from Adam: "I'm downstairs." She is obviously creeped out and turns off her light, hunkers down under her doona. Another text: "I saw you turn off your light."
She calls out his name shakily and then he appears in her doorway. Turns out he still has a key, yay! He demands milk and Hannah gets him some, dialling 911 as she crouches behind the fridge door. After Adam skulls the milk, he stands intimidatingly close to her and gives a speech about how objectively he admires her steadfastness in her decision to cut him out, but "as a man" he is never going to let up and he will never leave her alone.
What follows is him refusing to leave on her terms and the (black) physical comedy of her chasing him around the table and at one point shouting "this is space rape!"
I really did find this scary. I know because it's a comedy
that he's not going to rape her or physically hurt her in any way. But on
another level, I'm putting myself in her position, and I don't know if Adam
is Schrodinger's
Rapist.
She finally gets him out of her apartment (without
retrieving the key) and he is only a few steps away when she calls him back.
(This is classic Hannah, by the way: Go away! Go away! ... But not too
far away!) We don't find out what would happen because someone calls her
name and it's the police; they came in response to the 911 hangup ("Isn't
that a little alarmist?" Hannah asks). The relief that comes from this
revelation allows me to find funny what happens next: Hannah explains with a
characteristic lack of logic, "He didn't do anything wrong. I just wanted
to take out a restraining order on him" and then Adam decides maybe HE
wants to get a restraining order on HER because she once turned up at his house
in the middle of the night in knee-high socks and a mask. What?
Hannah's reaction to the police coming is all too accurate,
in terms of women reporting to police about abusive partners/ex-partners. Too
often abused people report their abusers and then retract the report, leaving law-enforcers
frustrated. I’m not saying it’s victims’ fault, it’s just an unfortunate thing
that happens. Anyway the writer makes the scene funny but the situation
certainly isn't. I guess that attests to her writerly talent.
What is unambiguously unfunny, however, is the
internet's reaction to this episode. I trawled google as soon as I finished
watching, of course, and was surprised to see how many recaps/commentaries
dismissed Hannah calling 911 as an over-reaction, and Adam as laughably
unmenacing. The subtext was that Hannah is just a silly girl. I had to keep
looking until I found someone who agreed with me that it was totally reasonable
for her to call 911, and Adam was genuinely scary.
I don't care how much of a 'silly girl' Hannah is. Adam's
behaviour is menacing and scary. And nobody deserves that, no
matter how many poor decisions they make.
In answer to the question posed in the title, we would be
better off taking Schrodinger’s Rapist seriously, and not belittling or
infanticising women who also do.
*HOW DOES THIS HAPPEN SO OFTEN ON TV?? Only once IRL have I
heard of someone being hit by a bus.
**I can count on one hand the number of times while watching
GIRLS that I have been happy with a decision Hannah has made, and this is one
of them. (Please also note that in this instance I am only using thumbs to
count with.)
***What follows is a detailed description of the scene in
question. It's probably more entertaining for you to watch it yourself, but I'm
writing it so you can follow my discussion without having to do so.
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