Complete Misunderstanding
When I was much younger I
used to be “hot” sexually speaking, tall, long hair, pretty face, thin. I know that now, I didn’t know it then. I am now too old to be “hot”. Which, as a
natural product of time, is fine with me.
But, as a “hot”, but naïve
young woman, people, men, used to yell at me on the street. From “Hey baby!” to “Wanna fuck?”
I learned, quite quickly, to
completely ignore these assaults (And I do mean assaults), pretending to be
oblivious.
Once, a friend of mine, a gay
man who lived in the same apartment complex as me, and also worked with me,
yelled at me on the street. And I, not
knowing that this was someone I knew who was being playful, ignored him.
When he caught up with me, he
asked me why I was so “stuck up”.
Did he not understand that
being yelled at on the street does not feel like a compliment? You would think he
would have known better.
This was in the early 80s,
does that make a difference?
8 comments:
No. I was hot in the 90s. Now I'm nearly 40 and I look back on the 90s just the same way, as a time when I felt assaulted on a semi-regular basis by people who thought their assaults were compliments. They didn't know I was often disgusted, frequently frightened, and regularly repulsed by it all. Sometimes I miss my hot exterior, but sometimes in a strange way I'm sort of relieved that this stage of my existence is mostly finished. Thanks for being back. I missed you.
I remember listening to a comedian talk about the difference between men and women. It is a woman's biggest nightmare to be propositioned by a complete stranger on the street and a man's biggest dream.
I remember those days and I like being older just fine, no longer thought of as a sex toy.
I've missed you. It's so nice to hear from you:)
Oh Meno. I've been following you (under like five different names and blogs, Imez?) for so many years. I'm so glad to read your voice again. I hope you're ok.
Yeah! Missed you a lot.
I was SO thrilled to see you pop up in my reader again! I've MISSED you!
No, it doesn't make a difference. People who respect you don't yell at you in the street - whether they're being playful or not.
Meno! So thrilled to see you in the blogworld again. Missed you terribly.
I can't imagine any time when it would have been fun or cool to be treated that way. I remember it being scary at times, and as I look back now, if there were times it wasn't scary, it should have been. Besides that, I don't remember a single one of those instances hearing someone say, "Baby, you got great brains!"
People can be absolutely clueless, and unaware of the vacuum once occupied by false cleverness.
Clever people know their audience.
I was away for awhile and then I thought, wonder what Meno's been up to? Then I came here and read and cried and then I read the last post which was like, over a year ago and sounded so sad and I got very worried about you. So I am just glad you're here. Very, very glad.
Robin
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