I have thoughts to add to my previous thoughts on the self-torture that is The Running.
Since posting that last one, I have:
Finished the 5K trainer app
Actually run (very slowly) an actual 5K
Finished the 10K trainer app
But have not yet run 10K
And over the months, some things have changed. Here are some additional little insights:
--If you are doing hills, firstly, you poor thing. Secondly, don't try to go slow on the downhill. It's actually more work. Just fall, and let your feet keep up with you. It will hurt less, and as an added bonus, you will go faster.
--If you are bringing water with you when you run, I highly recommend tossing a tablespoon of lemon juice in your water bottle. Don't even need sugar: just water and lemon is very nice on a dry throat.
--If your brain tells you these words: "Surely we can get this run in before that storm hits", go inside and stay there, you idiot.
But there's one variable that I had not yet encountered at last posting, and it needs to be addressed at some length. I speak, of course, of HEAT.
Formerly, we spoke of cold. Cold is very unpleasant, and a powerful deterrent to doing The Running. But Heat is a different monster entirely. Heat will probably not send you screaming back indoors--at least not at first. Heat is so pleasant-looking. It's bright and blue and cheerful. And it isn't even a little bit cold! How lovely!
I first encountered Heat at the beginning of April. Following my own wise counsel to never run the same route twice, I decided I would start from my place of employment and run through downtown Moorhead and over the pretty bridge up there into downtown Fargo. It was bright and sunny and cheerful outside. All was well.
Except it wasn't.
The thing about most downtowns is: there are no trees.
This is also a major design flaw of most bridges.
By the time I reached my turnaround point, I was gasping like a dying fish. Not because I was running any faster than I'd run last time, or very much farther--It was just the Heat. Weaseling into my lungs and skin and brain and slowly shutting everything down.
About seven minutes from the end of my run, a luckless friend called me.
"Luckless Friend," I gasped, "Tell me . . . a story!"
"What, right now?" asked Luckless Friend.
"YES! Any . . . story. Just . . . keep . . . talking."
Luckless Friend's phone call was much longer than anticipated as the poor faithful soul recounted to me an entirely improvised tale of discovering a ladder to Hell to keep me distracted from my imminent demise. I could relate, as I dragged my only semi-functional body through the last few minutes of torturous, listless jogging. Then I gave my frantic thanks to Luckless Friend, returned to my place of employment, and sat in the break room for twenty minutes sucking on ice cubes until I was reasonably sure I wouldn't vomit all over the inside of my car.
Because yes, Heat will make you vomit. It will do all kinds of nasty things to you, subtle things that you think you can muscle through and are probably just your imagination. They are not. Cold is unpleasant, yes, but when it comes to the Running, heat is downright dangerous.
So if you engage in the Running in a season or location that is susceptible to Heat, please heed this wise counsel:
--First: Do not play chicken with Heat. Do not convince yourself you are tough enough to beat it. You are not. That sun of ours isn't a very big star, in the grand scheme of things, but it is still much bigger than you and is not intimidated by your posturing. You are flammable. Don't forget it.
--Try altering the time of your Running. Go early in the morning or late in the evening. I've discovered that putting my midpoint right at sunset is very useful and comfortable. If you sleep through your early morning and are busy in your late evening, do NOT try running somewhere in the middle of the day anyway. Don't do it. Not safe.
--Find shade. If you have tree-rich neighborhoods, wild forests, river trails, go for those. Again, this is not you being a sissy: this is you having a teaspoonful of common sense.
--Try migrating indoors. No, not on a running track: those are insanely boring (round and round and round) and are populated by Spandex-wearing runny-people. Go for a treadmill instead. Treadmills are kind of weird. The whole "the floor is moving" thing is pretty disorienting, and will make you fall over if you think about it too hard. And treadmills give you WAY too much information about how far you've run and how fast you're going. But they are a space of sacred isolation: no one will challenge you to a friendly race on a treadmill. You can watch a show or something. Put a piece of paper over all the numbers, turn on the X-Files, and chug along. It's dull, but survivable.
--Accept that even with these precautions, sweat will ooze out of every orifice of your skin and make you disgusting all over, no matter how easy you're taking it on yourself. Drink much water. Do much laundry. Embrace the gross.
--Cut yourself some slack. If Heat causes you to miss some runs or cut runs short, GOOD. You should not be out raising your body temperature in that crap. Keep yourself out of the hospital and you can get back to your mighty Running Schedule of Doom (if you have one) when autumn settles in.
--Sunscreen. Duh.
Thursday, July 28, 2016
Tuesday, March 29, 2016
How To Do The Running, Which Sucks
Running sucks.
Let's just get that out of the way right now. It is the least pleasant form of exercise known to modern humans, outside of sportsball. It's painful, boring, lonely, competitive, and often cold or wet or both. It cannot be done in the privacy of one's own apartment.
I have been most determinedly anti-running since my one disastrous year on the cross country team. I joined up because, in my ongoing quest to observe and successfully mimic the behavior patterns of adolescent humans, I noticed a correlation between "people who run cross country" and "people who have much social capital." What I got, instead of an infusion of social capital, was months of runs far beyond my undeveloped capacity and a mix of shunning and humiliation from the team's actual members. Nope. Nope nope nope. Never again. No mas. Done.
And yet, here's the thing. Running may suck, but the ability to do it is dang useful. In an emergency situation several years ago, I tried to run for help and ended up puffing and wheezing and gasping 75% of the way to my goal. My lungs did not care that this was an emergency. They were weak and flimsy, as were my leg muscles and my floppy lazy heart, and could not have gone any farther if there had been a dinosaur after me. My thoughts would eventually have been "Heck with the dinosaur, I need a breather." And then the dinosaur would have eaten me.
So now, after what, nearly twenty years, I, me, my particular run-hating self, am learning to run again. And am discovering that, much like many activities introduced to me in the public school system, the activity itself is not what made the experience hellish. School is just really, really good at presenting everything in such a way that you will hate it forever.
So, as the sun has started creeping back over chilly little Moorhead, Minnesota and "outside" has been launching its annual ad campaign ("Outside! A Nice Place to Be!"), I downloaded a couch-to-5K app onto my phone and began to learn to run on MY terms.
I am now three weeks into this experiment, and the purpose of this blog post is to share with you, dear Reader, insights I have gained on How To Do The Running when The Running is a horrible thing to do.
I am writing this because most of the How To Do The Running articles I have encountered are full of lies. Lies like "Running is awesome! You totally get in the zone, and you get this runner's high, and it feels soooooo cool, dude!" This is untrue. There is no zone. There is no high. There is only the running. There is a sense of satisfaction, but it is akin to that of scrubbing off the grime on the metal things that live under the stove burners--a sense of "I did a boring, unpleasant, but useful task! I get ten adult points!"
So here are my thoughts on How To Do The Running.
1. Get an app. The phone app provides goals that are more reasonable than the goals you think you can set for yourself. "I'm gonna go out and run for a while!" you say, full of righteous optimism. No, you won't. You will run for a third of a block, and then you will walk, and then you will go home and remind yourself you're bad at this running thing and never try again. The goal of The Running is not to be good at The Running--it is to be good at making yourself do The Running repeatedly. The app will tell you to run for a little, then walk for a lot, then run for a little, then walk for a lot. Do not disobey the app: the app knows you better than you do. If the app says "This is not a running day. Do not run. Do not run again until tomorrow," obey it. The app knows you will get sick of running if you decide it is fun and you should do lots. You should not do lots. You should do a little. Trust the app.
2. Get some gear. Yes, I'm sorry, you need the gear. You need running shoes and headphones and a hair tie if your hair is long and something to cover your nakedness. Most of these you should already have in some form. The running shoes, maybe not. You must go and purchase them. They will be most comfy on your feet, reducing the amount of pain inflicted by The Running and thus its overall suckiness. The running shoes will be expensive, and if you only run with them once before giving up, that will be a very expensive run. My new running shoes cost sixty dollars. It cost me sixty dollars to run in them the first time. But the second time I ran in them, they only cost thirty dollars per run. Then twenty. Feed your inner cheapskate and watch your price-per-run go down.
3. Get some entertainment. Running is an inherently boring activity. Get an audio book or some of that music stuff or some of those podcast-thingys. Give yourself something, anything to listen to other than the sound of your throat trying to choke you to death to get you to stop running.
4. Get warm. People will tell you "Oh, you'll warm right up!" as they go out to do The Running in spandex shorts and a jog bra in January. These people are liars. You will not warm right up, because if you go outside in such a getup you will be freezing, and you will immediately go inside and drink three cups of cocoa instead of running. Ignore these people and their spandex. Be warm. If it is cold, put on enough clothes for you to go outside comfortably. If you don't, you won't go outside at all. You may be too warm after running for a while, but this is much better than being too cold and writing off the whole endeavor.
5. One thing you should not get: other people. Other people are awful. They say things like "Come on! I'll race you to that tree!" and "Keep pushing! Come on! You can do it!" Maybe you can do it and maybe you can't, but trying to do it will completely suck and then you will not want to do The Running ever again. Get rid of people. Stick with the app. The app will not let you fizzle out.
6. Never run the same route twice. If you run the same route twice, then you are automatically in a race with the last version of you that ran that route. You will think, "Last time I came this way, I made it to that mailbox. This time, I must make it farther. I must go past the mailbox." And then the next time, you have to go past the next mailbox, and then the next time you lie in bed shuddering at the thought of making yourself go all the way to the corner, and you do not go out to run. It is too hard. It gets harder every time. You stay inside and watch mediocre romantic comedies instead. Take a different route every time. See a different part of your town. Start from work instead of your house. Start from the grocery store parking lot instead of work. Please remember: your goal is not to go faster. Your goal is to go at all.
7. Do not work on speeding up your feet. First, focus on slowing down your breathing. Breathing is nice, and you enjoy doing it. Taking big, slow, deep breaths is good for you. When you start running, try to breathe in for six steps and out for six steps. When you need more air (which will be almost immediately), go to five steps per breath. Give yourself more air as you get tired. Air is good. Lack of air is a horrible feeling. The worst feeling is taking a breath every two steps and still not getting enough air. If you are doing this, you are running too fast, and it will suck, and you will quit.
But, you might say, if I never push myself to go faster, how will I get faster? How will I improve?
Here is the freaky secret: you will improve anyway. If you do The Running over and over again, you will get better at The Running. You do not have to make the experience awful in order to accomplish this. Pushing yourself might make you improve more quickly, but then you will be miserable and you will quit and you will un-improve and then not improve at all. Do not worry about going faster. You do not get a medal for going-faster-ness.* Your goal is not to go faster, remember. Your goal is to go at all. Faster will come. It will not feel like "RAAARR! I FEEL THE BURN! PUSH THROUGH IT!", which is the definition of success in some circles. It will feel like "Why am I going so slow? I feel fine. I could take longer steps and still be fine. Look at my longer steps! Yaay! Oh, time to walk now, says the app. We must do what the app says." This success is better because it will not result in, forty-eight hours later, saying to oneself "Why did I run so fast? It felt horrible. I hated it. I won't do it today." and then never doing it again.
This is my advice. It seemeth to me to be good advice, after three weeks of trying it out. That's right: I, me, my run-hating self, have been doing The Running on a regular basis for Three Whole Weeks. Last week, I measured of of my Runnings and discovered that I had traversed 2.2 miles. If you are a spandex-in-January-wearing, burn-feeling, zone-into-getting runny-person, this distance is laughable. If this is the case, I say: heck with you. Shut up. Go run away. You're good at that. Show us how good you are. No, keep going. We're not impressed yet. Off with you. Shoo.
To all the rest of you, I say: good luck. I can recommend some audiobooks if you'd like them.
*They do give these out, but not to the likes of you and me. They give them to people who think the point of The Running is to go faster than everybody else. These are the kind of people who will double the cost of their own plane ticket so they can get on the airplane before you do. They are mean and stupid people. Ignore them.
Let's just get that out of the way right now. It is the least pleasant form of exercise known to modern humans, outside of sportsball. It's painful, boring, lonely, competitive, and often cold or wet or both. It cannot be done in the privacy of one's own apartment.
I have been most determinedly anti-running since my one disastrous year on the cross country team. I joined up because, in my ongoing quest to observe and successfully mimic the behavior patterns of adolescent humans, I noticed a correlation between "people who run cross country" and "people who have much social capital." What I got, instead of an infusion of social capital, was months of runs far beyond my undeveloped capacity and a mix of shunning and humiliation from the team's actual members. Nope. Nope nope nope. Never again. No mas. Done.
And yet, here's the thing. Running may suck, but the ability to do it is dang useful. In an emergency situation several years ago, I tried to run for help and ended up puffing and wheezing and gasping 75% of the way to my goal. My lungs did not care that this was an emergency. They were weak and flimsy, as were my leg muscles and my floppy lazy heart, and could not have gone any farther if there had been a dinosaur after me. My thoughts would eventually have been "Heck with the dinosaur, I need a breather." And then the dinosaur would have eaten me.
So now, after what, nearly twenty years, I, me, my particular run-hating self, am learning to run again. And am discovering that, much like many activities introduced to me in the public school system, the activity itself is not what made the experience hellish. School is just really, really good at presenting everything in such a way that you will hate it forever.
So, as the sun has started creeping back over chilly little Moorhead, Minnesota and "outside" has been launching its annual ad campaign ("Outside! A Nice Place to Be!"), I downloaded a couch-to-5K app onto my phone and began to learn to run on MY terms.
I am now three weeks into this experiment, and the purpose of this blog post is to share with you, dear Reader, insights I have gained on How To Do The Running when The Running is a horrible thing to do.
I am writing this because most of the How To Do The Running articles I have encountered are full of lies. Lies like "Running is awesome! You totally get in the zone, and you get this runner's high, and it feels soooooo cool, dude!" This is untrue. There is no zone. There is no high. There is only the running. There is a sense of satisfaction, but it is akin to that of scrubbing off the grime on the metal things that live under the stove burners--a sense of "I did a boring, unpleasant, but useful task! I get ten adult points!"
So here are my thoughts on How To Do The Running.
1. Get an app. The phone app provides goals that are more reasonable than the goals you think you can set for yourself. "I'm gonna go out and run for a while!" you say, full of righteous optimism. No, you won't. You will run for a third of a block, and then you will walk, and then you will go home and remind yourself you're bad at this running thing and never try again. The goal of The Running is not to be good at The Running--it is to be good at making yourself do The Running repeatedly. The app will tell you to run for a little, then walk for a lot, then run for a little, then walk for a lot. Do not disobey the app: the app knows you better than you do. If the app says "This is not a running day. Do not run. Do not run again until tomorrow," obey it. The app knows you will get sick of running if you decide it is fun and you should do lots. You should not do lots. You should do a little. Trust the app.
2. Get some gear. Yes, I'm sorry, you need the gear. You need running shoes and headphones and a hair tie if your hair is long and something to cover your nakedness. Most of these you should already have in some form. The running shoes, maybe not. You must go and purchase them. They will be most comfy on your feet, reducing the amount of pain inflicted by The Running and thus its overall suckiness. The running shoes will be expensive, and if you only run with them once before giving up, that will be a very expensive run. My new running shoes cost sixty dollars. It cost me sixty dollars to run in them the first time. But the second time I ran in them, they only cost thirty dollars per run. Then twenty. Feed your inner cheapskate and watch your price-per-run go down.
3. Get some entertainment. Running is an inherently boring activity. Get an audio book or some of that music stuff or some of those podcast-thingys. Give yourself something, anything to listen to other than the sound of your throat trying to choke you to death to get you to stop running.
4. Get warm. People will tell you "Oh, you'll warm right up!" as they go out to do The Running in spandex shorts and a jog bra in January. These people are liars. You will not warm right up, because if you go outside in such a getup you will be freezing, and you will immediately go inside and drink three cups of cocoa instead of running. Ignore these people and their spandex. Be warm. If it is cold, put on enough clothes for you to go outside comfortably. If you don't, you won't go outside at all. You may be too warm after running for a while, but this is much better than being too cold and writing off the whole endeavor.
5. One thing you should not get: other people. Other people are awful. They say things like "Come on! I'll race you to that tree!" and "Keep pushing! Come on! You can do it!" Maybe you can do it and maybe you can't, but trying to do it will completely suck and then you will not want to do The Running ever again. Get rid of people. Stick with the app. The app will not let you fizzle out.
6. Never run the same route twice. If you run the same route twice, then you are automatically in a race with the last version of you that ran that route. You will think, "Last time I came this way, I made it to that mailbox. This time, I must make it farther. I must go past the mailbox." And then the next time, you have to go past the next mailbox, and then the next time you lie in bed shuddering at the thought of making yourself go all the way to the corner, and you do not go out to run. It is too hard. It gets harder every time. You stay inside and watch mediocre romantic comedies instead. Take a different route every time. See a different part of your town. Start from work instead of your house. Start from the grocery store parking lot instead of work. Please remember: your goal is not to go faster. Your goal is to go at all.
7. Do not work on speeding up your feet. First, focus on slowing down your breathing. Breathing is nice, and you enjoy doing it. Taking big, slow, deep breaths is good for you. When you start running, try to breathe in for six steps and out for six steps. When you need more air (which will be almost immediately), go to five steps per breath. Give yourself more air as you get tired. Air is good. Lack of air is a horrible feeling. The worst feeling is taking a breath every two steps and still not getting enough air. If you are doing this, you are running too fast, and it will suck, and you will quit.
But, you might say, if I never push myself to go faster, how will I get faster? How will I improve?
Here is the freaky secret: you will improve anyway. If you do The Running over and over again, you will get better at The Running. You do not have to make the experience awful in order to accomplish this. Pushing yourself might make you improve more quickly, but then you will be miserable and you will quit and you will un-improve and then not improve at all. Do not worry about going faster. You do not get a medal for going-faster-ness.* Your goal is not to go faster, remember. Your goal is to go at all. Faster will come. It will not feel like "RAAARR! I FEEL THE BURN! PUSH THROUGH IT!", which is the definition of success in some circles. It will feel like "Why am I going so slow? I feel fine. I could take longer steps and still be fine. Look at my longer steps! Yaay! Oh, time to walk now, says the app. We must do what the app says." This success is better because it will not result in, forty-eight hours later, saying to oneself "Why did I run so fast? It felt horrible. I hated it. I won't do it today." and then never doing it again.
This is my advice. It seemeth to me to be good advice, after three weeks of trying it out. That's right: I, me, my run-hating self, have been doing The Running on a regular basis for Three Whole Weeks. Last week, I measured of of my Runnings and discovered that I had traversed 2.2 miles. If you are a spandex-in-January-wearing, burn-feeling, zone-into-getting runny-person, this distance is laughable. If this is the case, I say: heck with you. Shut up. Go run away. You're good at that. Show us how good you are. No, keep going. We're not impressed yet. Off with you. Shoo.
To all the rest of you, I say: good luck. I can recommend some audiobooks if you'd like them.
*They do give these out, but not to the likes of you and me. They give them to people who think the point of The Running is to go faster than everybody else. These are the kind of people who will double the cost of their own plane ticket so they can get on the airplane before you do. They are mean and stupid people. Ignore them.
Sunday, December 7, 2014
A Quantifiable Analysis of Why I Am Still Single
I've had this conversation more times than I can count.
Me: Hey, hi! How are you!
Well-Intentioned Other: Oh, just fine. How about you?
Me: Just great!
W-I O: That's wonderful! So, are you seeing anyone?
Me: Nope.
W-I O: Well, how can that be?
There are some variations on this last line. Sometimes it is an expression of incredulity ("Oh, come on. That can't be true.") as though it's obvious that I must be going on dates; I'm clearly just too stupid to notice them when they happen. But often it's the question: Nobody's asking you out? What's wrong with you?
Laying aside the sub-surface rudeness of this question, it's counterproductive. Asking a person why no one will date her is like asking her what that thing is on the back of her head: the person you're asking is in the worst possible position to be able to answer the question for you. Ask almost anyone else, and you will get better information.
There are certain things that are Simply Not Done, even in our permissive modern society. One of these things is to inquire of a person, "Excuse me, but why are you not sexually attracted to me? If you could give me three or four specific reasons, that would be very helpful." This is Simply Not Done because there is no possible answer that could be considered polite, and we try not to force our friends into acts of breathtaking rudeness if we can avoid it.
But the question still haunts: what's wrong? If the normal, expected course of events is for a person to be actively pursued by at least a few others, then why is that not happening in (Person X's) case? The knowledge would be intensely helpful, either for making changes or for washing one's hands of things that cannot be changed, but it remains elusive.
Until now.
I've heard the joke tossed around many a time amongst single people: "Someone should just take a survey!" "I know, right?" This week, I decided to up'n'do it. The crucial obstacle to obtaining useful data (fear of being rude on the part of those surveyed) can be mitigated by the anonymity of the Internet. Accordingly, I wrote and distributed an anonymous survey.
But the question still haunts: what's wrong? If the normal, expected course of events is for a person to be actively pursued by at least a few others, then why is that not happening in (Person X's) case? The knowledge would be intensely helpful, either for making changes or for washing one's hands of things that cannot be changed, but it remains elusive.
Until now.
I've heard the joke tossed around many a time amongst single people: "Someone should just take a survey!" "I know, right?" This week, I decided to up'n'do it. The crucial obstacle to obtaining useful data (fear of being rude on the part of those surveyed) can be mitigated by the anonymity of the Internet. Accordingly, I wrote and distributed an anonymous survey.
The survey was divided into two parts: What's Wrong With You?, including possible reasons a person might have for not dating me that have nothing to do with me, and What's Wrong With Her?, a list of my traits and perceived traits that might discourage a person from pursuing a romantic relationship with me. First, I will discuss the What's Wrong With You? data.
Beyond criminalizing gay marriage, the only other actionable option in this category is that of living too far away. I may need to either move closer to most of the people that I know (which might be complicated, as some are in Korea, some in England, others in New Zealand, and at least two in west Africa) or invest heavily in a global public transportation network.
Of note is the rather dark horse category of "I have a dark and tortured past . . ." (indicated as "Byronic archetype" on the graph above). This category was much more popular than expected, with 14 responses. I evidently know more Byrons than I'd thought.
One further category of note is "She already has turned me down (indicated is "Previously rejected"). According to the prevailing theory that single women in their late twenties are "too picky," this category should be quite robust. Instead, it received only 3 responses. Moreover, these responses were 67% correlated with "I am in a monogamous relationship" responses. This would seem to indicate that of the persons whose advances I have spurned, fully two-thirds of them were already married/spoken for (in which case, good for me) or have since become so (in which case, my rejection clearly did them no lasting harm). (The remaining respondent also indicated that he/she was a Byronic archetype, so my rejection was probably wise, if not kind.)
Dismissing Respondent 5 left several categories empty, including: "brunette," "too fat," "too thin," "breasts too large," "breasts too small," and "smells objectionable." These data (or lack thereof) clearly indicate that the entire beauty industry is a futile waste of effort and resources.
The chart below shows the results of the survey once Respondent 5's results were discounted, and the resulting empty categories dismissed from the analysis.
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The data presents us with several problems of analysis. For example, "Too confident" and "Lack of self-esteem" each received 4 responses, despite being antithetical. Thus, I am unable to decide whether I should attempt to attract more suitors by being more confident or less so. "Taller" scored reasonably high (pardon the pun), but less than expected, tying with "Vegetarian" at 8 votes, and lagging behind such unexpected results as "Too physically attractive" (9 votes) and "I think she is a witch" (11 votes).
Other high-scorers included "Too feminist" and "Too Mormon", though these responses were almost entirely mutually exclusive (the only exception, Respondent 49, also indicated "I don't know who she is or remember how she got on my Facebook," so we will not lend too much credence to his/her input). This may indicate that in attempting to please everyone, I have ended up pleasing no one, or possibly that Mormon feminists in general are just caught between the proverbial rock and hard place when it comes to dating.
"I don't know who she is or remember how she got on my Facebook" gained unexpectedly high marks (13) indicating that I don't know enough of the people that I know, which shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone who knows me.
"She is smarter than me" and "I think she is straight" also performed well, at 17 and 19, respectively. The latter concern is not terribly helpful, since to the best of my knowledge I was born straight and will continue to be so at least until scholars conclusively determine the fundamental nature of human sexuality (which may take a while). The "she is smarter than me" problem might be more easily rectified, either through determined acting or the judicious use of inhaled cleaning solvents, but I fear that in this case the cure may be worse than the disease.
The two most telling results, though, are these: "I can't articulate why, but I'm just not physically attracted to her" (15) and "Other" (the clear leader at 22). These responses imply that the impenetrable fog that surrounds human attraction may not be entirely due to our desire to be polite; it may simply be that we don't know what attracts us to other people. Uncovering motivations below the level of the conscious mind, while a fascinating prospect, is beyond the scope of this study.
In any case, the next time a kindly, well-intentioned person demands to know how it can possibly be that I am not currently the object of anyone's sexual desire, I'll certainly have plenty to say on the subject.
***
The research team would like to thank Respondents 1-4 and 6-98, Google Forms, Google Spreadheets, and the National Science Foundation for their invaluable assistance with this project.
Wednesday, November 5, 2014
If a Woman Have Long Hair
I will never, ever cut off my hair.
It's extraordinary stuff, my hair. Not as thick and dense as Cat's, nor as unapologetically curly as Bethe's, it hovers somewhere in between--a long, complex, casually elegant tumble of nonchalant half-curls that are called 'beach waves' by those who know about such things. It is deep, dark brown, but catches the light in red.
It is not beautiful the way it ought to be beautiful. It does not catch the eyes of men. The one man who was ever in a position to comment upon it found it annoying. His loss. My hair is not here to impress anyone else. It is mine.
I began braiding my own hair in the late nineties, when I was about ten years old. Before then, my mother had always done it for me. My mother's hair is straight as a pin all the way down; she was simultaneously frustrated by and proud of my troublesome, tangle-prone locks. Children are not the mirror of their parents, but the interpretation.
I learned to braid before I first went to summer camp, so I could keep my hair sensibly out of trouble in the woods. But like so many things, what began as an artistic option became a socially imposed necessity.
I do not think that I went out in public without my hair braided, except on very rare and special occasions, from 1997 to 2003. It was always the same: one thick braid, straight down my back, tied with a black or brown elastic. Never a French braid or a fishtail, never one set high on the crown of my head to start, never one plait shorter than the maximum my length could hold.
1997 was when the bullying really started. People whose names and faces are now lost to me extracted confidence and social clout from my tears like petroleum from crude oil. They were so cruel for so long that I almost forgot I did not deserve it. They mocked my behavior, my clothes, my habits, my speech, my smell. But they never noticed my hair, in one plain, unremarkable braid down my back. More fools they.
My hair was where I kept my sense of self-worth, woven tight among the plaits, pulled snug against my skull. Through 1997 and 1998 and 1999, that dangerous knowledge stayed knitted away, and I was the Mme. Defarge that wove it there every morning. The beauty of my hair was my secret. My classmates never saw it, and thus could not laugh at it and take away its value and meaning like they'd done to so much else. My hair was the only thing that was mine about me.
In 1999, I moved away. I wept like I was being dragged bodily out of the Stockholm Kreditbanken.
In 2003 I set foot in a public school with my hair loose around my shoulders for the first time in over five years. It felt like being naked: vulnerable and terrifying. Here was my closely guarded secret--my basic, fundamental worth--on display for the world to see and laugh at. My hair screamed at the world: I MATTER. My hair defied the world to prove it wrong.
It has not. Not yet.
I've yet to forgive those idiot children back in Minnesota who knew not what they did. I suppose I should. I should pray for them. I'm still more pleased with the thought of throttling them with the long, thick, inexorable cord of my hair. You missed a spot.
But now my hair is lying across my shoulder, long and languid, forming absentminded corkscrews while it waits for me to finish blogging and go to bed. It has not been desecrated or chopped off. It is still mine, as much as any mortal thing can be. So I'm off to sleep, and the irrepressible knowledge of my own inherent worth will tickle my cheek as I dream.
It's extraordinary stuff, my hair. Not as thick and dense as Cat's, nor as unapologetically curly as Bethe's, it hovers somewhere in between--a long, complex, casually elegant tumble of nonchalant half-curls that are called 'beach waves' by those who know about such things. It is deep, dark brown, but catches the light in red.
It is not beautiful the way it ought to be beautiful. It does not catch the eyes of men. The one man who was ever in a position to comment upon it found it annoying. His loss. My hair is not here to impress anyone else. It is mine.
I began braiding my own hair in the late nineties, when I was about ten years old. Before then, my mother had always done it for me. My mother's hair is straight as a pin all the way down; she was simultaneously frustrated by and proud of my troublesome, tangle-prone locks. Children are not the mirror of their parents, but the interpretation.
I learned to braid before I first went to summer camp, so I could keep my hair sensibly out of trouble in the woods. But like so many things, what began as an artistic option became a socially imposed necessity.
I do not think that I went out in public without my hair braided, except on very rare and special occasions, from 1997 to 2003. It was always the same: one thick braid, straight down my back, tied with a black or brown elastic. Never a French braid or a fishtail, never one set high on the crown of my head to start, never one plait shorter than the maximum my length could hold.
1997 was when the bullying really started. People whose names and faces are now lost to me extracted confidence and social clout from my tears like petroleum from crude oil. They were so cruel for so long that I almost forgot I did not deserve it. They mocked my behavior, my clothes, my habits, my speech, my smell. But they never noticed my hair, in one plain, unremarkable braid down my back. More fools they.
My hair was where I kept my sense of self-worth, woven tight among the plaits, pulled snug against my skull. Through 1997 and 1998 and 1999, that dangerous knowledge stayed knitted away, and I was the Mme. Defarge that wove it there every morning. The beauty of my hair was my secret. My classmates never saw it, and thus could not laugh at it and take away its value and meaning like they'd done to so much else. My hair was the only thing that was mine about me.
In 1999, I moved away. I wept like I was being dragged bodily out of the Stockholm Kreditbanken.
In 2003 I set foot in a public school with my hair loose around my shoulders for the first time in over five years. It felt like being naked: vulnerable and terrifying. Here was my closely guarded secret--my basic, fundamental worth--on display for the world to see and laugh at. My hair screamed at the world: I MATTER. My hair defied the world to prove it wrong.
It has not. Not yet.
I've yet to forgive those idiot children back in Minnesota who knew not what they did. I suppose I should. I should pray for them. I'm still more pleased with the thought of throttling them with the long, thick, inexorable cord of my hair. You missed a spot.
But now my hair is lying across my shoulder, long and languid, forming absentminded corkscrews while it waits for me to finish blogging and go to bed. It has not been desecrated or chopped off. It is still mine, as much as any mortal thing can be. So I'm off to sleep, and the irrepressible knowledge of my own inherent worth will tickle my cheek as I dream.
Sunday, September 28, 2014
Nothing to Fear But . . .
There's a thunderstorm happening outside.
I'm writing this to help myself calm down so I can sleep . . . school in the morning, and all.
Okay. So I've stated before on this blog that there are three things in life that scare me: heights, needles, and thunderstorms.
The scar on the inside of my right elbow is evidence to my courage in the face of needles. I'm willingly getting stuck with a big fat needle twice a week to help finish off the last of my student loan from London (plastitution at its finest). I hiss when the needle goes in, and I can't look at it, but I can take the stick. I'm brave.
I can manage heights. I think. I'm not called upon to confront them very often. Except ladders. And I can manage ladders okay.
Nearly everything else in the world, I'm not scared of. Spiders? Cute. Dark alleys? Bring 'em on. Bats? Old news. Public speaking? As if. Ticks? Eat 'em for breakfast. I am not the sort of person who has to wander through the world being afraid. I'm big, and confident, and clever, and powerful. I've got this life thing under control.
But I don't have thunderstorms under control.
I've got tears on my cheeks as I type this. Tears. I'm crying. Not dramatically or anything, but . . . I've never cried before. Not even the night this all started. I've jumped, and screamed, and ended up perched on top of furniture . . . I've flinched, and gasped, and cowered. But I've never cried. Why am I crying? I know that the odds of lightning hurting me are astronomical, particularly as I'm writing this from inside a snug and sturdy building. And I know that thunder does nobody any harm whatsoever. I know this. So why am I crying? After two years?
I do not have freakin' PTSD. I know; I Googled it as soon as the tears started. But neither do I have control of this crap.
I used to think maybe I was being reflexively melodramatic, that I was playing up my tendency to jump out of my skin because it made people give me hugs. But why would I do that, when I know that I can just ask for hugs, and usually get them? And who am I showing off to, curled up in my own bed? Did I bring this upon myself, by letting myself gasp all those times? Letting myself shake? And does the fact that I'm blogging about this invalidate my concern that this might not be just a plea for attention?
Blast if I know. Somebody get Freud down here. He'd probably have something entertaining to say about how lightning and thunder are a metaphor for my repressed Electra complex or something. (Electra = electricity? He'd go there. I know he would.)
Okay, I'm cracking jokes now. I must be feeling better. And the rain has stopped, and there hasn't been a strike in the last couple of minutes. I'm off to brush my teeth and see what I can do about sleeping.
Thanks for listening, Internet.
I'm writing this to help myself calm down so I can sleep . . . school in the morning, and all.
Okay. So I've stated before on this blog that there are three things in life that scare me: heights, needles, and thunderstorms.
The scar on the inside of my right elbow is evidence to my courage in the face of needles. I'm willingly getting stuck with a big fat needle twice a week to help finish off the last of my student loan from London (plastitution at its finest). I hiss when the needle goes in, and I can't look at it, but I can take the stick. I'm brave.
I can manage heights. I think. I'm not called upon to confront them very often. Except ladders. And I can manage ladders okay.
Nearly everything else in the world, I'm not scared of. Spiders? Cute. Dark alleys? Bring 'em on. Bats? Old news. Public speaking? As if. Ticks? Eat 'em for breakfast. I am not the sort of person who has to wander through the world being afraid. I'm big, and confident, and clever, and powerful. I've got this life thing under control.
But I don't have thunderstorms under control.
I've got tears on my cheeks as I type this. Tears. I'm crying. Not dramatically or anything, but . . . I've never cried before. Not even the night this all started. I've jumped, and screamed, and ended up perched on top of furniture . . . I've flinched, and gasped, and cowered. But I've never cried. Why am I crying? I know that the odds of lightning hurting me are astronomical, particularly as I'm writing this from inside a snug and sturdy building. And I know that thunder does nobody any harm whatsoever. I know this. So why am I crying? After two years?
I do not have freakin' PTSD. I know; I Googled it as soon as the tears started. But neither do I have control of this crap.
I used to think maybe I was being reflexively melodramatic, that I was playing up my tendency to jump out of my skin because it made people give me hugs. But why would I do that, when I know that I can just ask for hugs, and usually get them? And who am I showing off to, curled up in my own bed? Did I bring this upon myself, by letting myself gasp all those times? Letting myself shake? And does the fact that I'm blogging about this invalidate my concern that this might not be just a plea for attention?
Blast if I know. Somebody get Freud down here. He'd probably have something entertaining to say about how lightning and thunder are a metaphor for my repressed Electra complex or something. (Electra = electricity? He'd go there. I know he would.)
Okay, I'm cracking jokes now. I must be feeling better. And the rain has stopped, and there hasn't been a strike in the last couple of minutes. I'm off to brush my teeth and see what I can do about sleeping.
Thanks for listening, Internet.
Tuesday, September 23, 2014
The Sociopolitical Complexities of Self-Improvement, or, How to Make Yourself Do Push-Ups
"I swear, I'm so ANGRY right now! I'll avenge your beautiful hand and your beautiful foot! I'll chop the legs off every dragon I fight! With my face!"
How to Train Your Dragon
I've just had a thought.
This thought has two points of origin. The first is John Oliver's brilliant segment on the Miss America pageant from this week's Last Week Tonight, which you really should watch if you haven't yet. The second is my semester goal.
I've discovered that I can handle semester goals. New Year's Resolutions can bite me, but a semester goal is manageable. And, at least for me, a four-month goal can become a habit. Last fall semester, for example, I decided to swear off fast food and meat until Christmas. Both of these have worked out quite well. I now regularly pack my lunch to work, and that lunch tends to be made of black beans, noodles, quinoa, or lentils. Very healthy, extremely cheap, quite yummy. (The yumminess took some practice, but we got there in the end.)
This semester, I have decided I'm gonna freakin' exercise. This has always been a problem for me, because I am A. lazy, B. poor, and C. self-conscious. This fairly well rules out any exercise that I have to leave my house for. Swimming's a hassle that puts my body on display. Gym classes cost money. Cycling has a tendency to leave me stranded far from home in the cold and the dark with a flat tire. Kayaking is wonderful, but only while the weather holds, and it involves a fair bit of there-and-back transportation. And anyone who suggests any kind of competitive sport is gonna get a kick in the shins.
So I've been doing these: Nerdfitness.com's Body Weight Circuits. Zero money, zero travel time, zero special equipment. I can huff and puff and blow my lungs out in the privacy of my own room and the privacy of my own underwear (I don't own workout clothes. Seriously, none at all). And so far, it's been really pretty good! I'll watch or listen to something while I do my circuits, then pop immediately into the shower as soon as I've completed my daily squats and lunges and push-ups. No muss, no fuss.
Of course, I loathe being in pain. I'm a complete sissy about it. So doing "just one more" push-up is decidedly NOT my idea of a good time. And I've never managed to do it consistently in the past. So why is this working so well now?
That's where John Oliver and Miss America come back in. See, exercise for me carries this far-off, teasing promise: If you do this enough, eventually you will be beautiful. You'll be beautiful enough for someone to love you. Beauty is a weapon in the competition of singleness; it allows you to dominate other women and claim a partner for your own. Maybe. If you're also a nice person. And smart, but not too smart. And just dang lucky. But you'd better be doing your workouts, or the kindness and smartness and luck aren't gonna do you a bit of good. It's a buyer's market out there. You've got to beat out the competition.
I hate competition.
Like haaaaate.
And this is why I've never exercised regularly. Because fitness means beauty and beauty means competing and competing means somebody has to lose. I would much rather stay quietly at home and marathon-watch The X-Files than engage in a competitive sport like spouse-hunting where somebody, inevitably, is gonna get hurt.
So I've given myself a new far-off promise: If you do this enough, you will be strong. You'll be strong enough to lift boxes of costumes and heavy wooden benches and sections of the dock. You'll be strong enough to haul huge coolers of cranberry juice up and down hills, to keep injured victims afloat in deep water. You'll be strong enough to be useful at camp.
And that's a great promise. That's amazing. Because I will do pretty much anything to be useful at camp. Useful at camp is my favorite thing to be. If I am strong, I can help. I can serve. There's no possibility of me losing, because it's not a competition. If I am stronger, everybody wins.
I can't serve people with beauty. I can't use my face to do any good in the world for anyone except myself, and even then, the good for me would be harm for someone else. But I can serve with strength. I can haul things and lift things and fix things and climb things. I can be not simply good, but good for something. And that is so satisfying. Satisfying enough to merit one more push-up.
How to Train Your Dragon
I've just had a thought.
This thought has two points of origin. The first is John Oliver's brilliant segment on the Miss America pageant from this week's Last Week Tonight, which you really should watch if you haven't yet. The second is my semester goal.
I've discovered that I can handle semester goals. New Year's Resolutions can bite me, but a semester goal is manageable. And, at least for me, a four-month goal can become a habit. Last fall semester, for example, I decided to swear off fast food and meat until Christmas. Both of these have worked out quite well. I now regularly pack my lunch to work, and that lunch tends to be made of black beans, noodles, quinoa, or lentils. Very healthy, extremely cheap, quite yummy. (The yumminess took some practice, but we got there in the end.)
This semester, I have decided I'm gonna freakin' exercise. This has always been a problem for me, because I am A. lazy, B. poor, and C. self-conscious. This fairly well rules out any exercise that I have to leave my house for. Swimming's a hassle that puts my body on display. Gym classes cost money. Cycling has a tendency to leave me stranded far from home in the cold and the dark with a flat tire. Kayaking is wonderful, but only while the weather holds, and it involves a fair bit of there-and-back transportation. And anyone who suggests any kind of competitive sport is gonna get a kick in the shins.
So I've been doing these: Nerdfitness.com's Body Weight Circuits. Zero money, zero travel time, zero special equipment. I can huff and puff and blow my lungs out in the privacy of my own room and the privacy of my own underwear (I don't own workout clothes. Seriously, none at all). And so far, it's been really pretty good! I'll watch or listen to something while I do my circuits, then pop immediately into the shower as soon as I've completed my daily squats and lunges and push-ups. No muss, no fuss.
Of course, I loathe being in pain. I'm a complete sissy about it. So doing "just one more" push-up is decidedly NOT my idea of a good time. And I've never managed to do it consistently in the past. So why is this working so well now?
That's where John Oliver and Miss America come back in. See, exercise for me carries this far-off, teasing promise: If you do this enough, eventually you will be beautiful. You'll be beautiful enough for someone to love you. Beauty is a weapon in the competition of singleness; it allows you to dominate other women and claim a partner for your own. Maybe. If you're also a nice person. And smart, but not too smart. And just dang lucky. But you'd better be doing your workouts, or the kindness and smartness and luck aren't gonna do you a bit of good. It's a buyer's market out there. You've got to beat out the competition.
I hate competition.
Like haaaaate.
And this is why I've never exercised regularly. Because fitness means beauty and beauty means competing and competing means somebody has to lose. I would much rather stay quietly at home and marathon-watch The X-Files than engage in a competitive sport like spouse-hunting where somebody, inevitably, is gonna get hurt.
So I've given myself a new far-off promise: If you do this enough, you will be strong. You'll be strong enough to lift boxes of costumes and heavy wooden benches and sections of the dock. You'll be strong enough to haul huge coolers of cranberry juice up and down hills, to keep injured victims afloat in deep water. You'll be strong enough to be useful at camp.
And that's a great promise. That's amazing. Because I will do pretty much anything to be useful at camp. Useful at camp is my favorite thing to be. If I am strong, I can help. I can serve. There's no possibility of me losing, because it's not a competition. If I am stronger, everybody wins.
I can't serve people with beauty. I can't use my face to do any good in the world for anyone except myself, and even then, the good for me would be harm for someone else. But I can serve with strength. I can haul things and lift things and fix things and climb things. I can be not simply good, but good for something. And that is so satisfying. Satisfying enough to merit one more push-up.
Thursday, May 29, 2014
The Problem is the Bear
"What's going to happen's going to happen. Just make sure it doesn't happen to you."
"Max, don't you EVER say that again!"
The Sound of Music
TW: Rape.
So, if you've been on the internet at all in the past week, I assume you're up to speed on #YesAllWomen. If not, head over to Twitter and read for a few hours.
You back yet? Okay, good.
In the conversations that have been consuming nearly all my energy and attention, I've repeatedly seen comments encouraging women to protect themselves from rape. Lots of resources have been suggested: the buddy system. Martial arts training. Keychain pepper spray. Apps like Kitestring. Clothes like AR Wear. Viciously spiked anti-rape condoms like RapeX. (Though the vindictive part of me clamors approval for any measure against rapists that involves viscous spikes. But, as you'll see below, even spikes don't address the real problem.)
Those with a little more experience in the conversation decry these suggestions as "victim blaming." But the people making the suggestions don't seem to get it. So here's another way to think about it.
My freshman year of college, I was walking home late at night. A young gentleman, the worse for drink, approached me and introduced himself. He was from Texas. He wanted me to run away back to Texas with him. He was rather insistent.
Luckily, he'd encountered me only about a block from my apartment, so by the time his invitation escalated into a shouted monologue in which the word "bitch" featured heavily, I was in my well-lit courtyard surrounded by people and could sprint up the stairs into the safety of my kitchen.
I did everything right. More than everything. I was taller and heavier than this guy, and I have a few years of martial arts training. Beyond that, the party I was on my way home from was a medieval one, so I was wearing a sword. Yes, a sword. I was safe that night. Nothing happened to me.
But that guy was still wandering the neighborhood, drunk and looking for some action.
Was there another student walking home later on? One not as big and powerful as I am, one without the confidence that comes with martial arts, one who was unarmed, one who had more than a block to go before she reached safety? What happened to her?
No matter how many resources we employ to ensure our own safety, at the end of the day, we're not stopping rapists. We're just redirecting them onto someone else.
It's like the old joke: How fast do you need to run to escape a hungry bear? Answer: faster than the slowest person in your group.
I've been through so much this week. So many stories, from strangers and from dear friends. Stories of molestation, manipulation, and assault, of broken lives and shattered safety. Stories of good returned missionaries who wouldn't take "no" for an answer and of good bishops who told rape victims they needed to repent. And through all of it, I'm naturally thinking: Thank goodness that hasn't happened to me.
Of course I'm glad it hasn't happened to me. I'm human. Having a bad thing happen to someone else is infinitely preferable. But it still isn't good enough. Because rapists are not an act of God, like a tornado or a hurricane or a deer walking in front of your car. They are human beings with free will who make the decision to rape. Not all of them know that's what they're doing. They may not call it that in their heads. But they make the choice to gratify their own desires at the expense of someone else's safety. And that's behavior. And human behavior, unlike tornadoes, can be changed.
The problem here isn't the speed of the various members of your group. The problem is the bear.
So please, everyone: stop, stop, stop. Stop telling women to learn to run faster. Stop telling us to carry weapons, cover our shoulders, stay inside after dark. Stop telling us to make sure to always run with a slower person, who can be eaten by the bear in our stead. We're sisters. All of us. And none of us should be eaten by a bear. Making it happen to someone else is not enough of a solution.
Maybe that drunk Texan raped another student in my place. Maybe the man who tried to get me into his car when I was fifteen persuaded some other girl in my neighborhood instead. And I'm not okay with that.
So let's talk about reporting and prosecution. Let's talk about those thousands of untested rape kits languishing in police labs across the country. Let's talk about teaching consent. Let's talk about how to make raping more shameful than being raped. Let's talk about how we can deal with the bear. Because I'm sick of running.
"Max, don't you EVER say that again!"
The Sound of Music
TW: Rape.
So, if you've been on the internet at all in the past week, I assume you're up to speed on #YesAllWomen. If not, head over to Twitter and read for a few hours.
You back yet? Okay, good.
In the conversations that have been consuming nearly all my energy and attention, I've repeatedly seen comments encouraging women to protect themselves from rape. Lots of resources have been suggested: the buddy system. Martial arts training. Keychain pepper spray. Apps like Kitestring. Clothes like AR Wear. Viciously spiked anti-rape condoms like RapeX. (Though the vindictive part of me clamors approval for any measure against rapists that involves viscous spikes. But, as you'll see below, even spikes don't address the real problem.)
Those with a little more experience in the conversation decry these suggestions as "victim blaming." But the people making the suggestions don't seem to get it. So here's another way to think about it.
My freshman year of college, I was walking home late at night. A young gentleman, the worse for drink, approached me and introduced himself. He was from Texas. He wanted me to run away back to Texas with him. He was rather insistent.
Luckily, he'd encountered me only about a block from my apartment, so by the time his invitation escalated into a shouted monologue in which the word "bitch" featured heavily, I was in my well-lit courtyard surrounded by people and could sprint up the stairs into the safety of my kitchen.
I did everything right. More than everything. I was taller and heavier than this guy, and I have a few years of martial arts training. Beyond that, the party I was on my way home from was a medieval one, so I was wearing a sword. Yes, a sword. I was safe that night. Nothing happened to me.
But that guy was still wandering the neighborhood, drunk and looking for some action.
Was there another student walking home later on? One not as big and powerful as I am, one without the confidence that comes with martial arts, one who was unarmed, one who had more than a block to go before she reached safety? What happened to her?
No matter how many resources we employ to ensure our own safety, at the end of the day, we're not stopping rapists. We're just redirecting them onto someone else.
It's like the old joke: How fast do you need to run to escape a hungry bear? Answer: faster than the slowest person in your group.
I've been through so much this week. So many stories, from strangers and from dear friends. Stories of molestation, manipulation, and assault, of broken lives and shattered safety. Stories of good returned missionaries who wouldn't take "no" for an answer and of good bishops who told rape victims they needed to repent. And through all of it, I'm naturally thinking: Thank goodness that hasn't happened to me.
Of course I'm glad it hasn't happened to me. I'm human. Having a bad thing happen to someone else is infinitely preferable. But it still isn't good enough. Because rapists are not an act of God, like a tornado or a hurricane or a deer walking in front of your car. They are human beings with free will who make the decision to rape. Not all of them know that's what they're doing. They may not call it that in their heads. But they make the choice to gratify their own desires at the expense of someone else's safety. And that's behavior. And human behavior, unlike tornadoes, can be changed.
The problem here isn't the speed of the various members of your group. The problem is the bear.
So please, everyone: stop, stop, stop. Stop telling women to learn to run faster. Stop telling us to carry weapons, cover our shoulders, stay inside after dark. Stop telling us to make sure to always run with a slower person, who can be eaten by the bear in our stead. We're sisters. All of us. And none of us should be eaten by a bear. Making it happen to someone else is not enough of a solution.
Maybe that drunk Texan raped another student in my place. Maybe the man who tried to get me into his car when I was fifteen persuaded some other girl in my neighborhood instead. And I'm not okay with that.
So let's talk about reporting and prosecution. Let's talk about those thousands of untested rape kits languishing in police labs across the country. Let's talk about teaching consent. Let's talk about how to make raping more shameful than being raped. Let's talk about how we can deal with the bear. Because I'm sick of running.
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