Angry Woman

Last week I went on a trip to California to celebrate the love of two wonderful people. Last year when I received the save the date my idea of travel plans included a huge road trip I had been dreaming up for years, with my partner at the time and my dog. Things changed and I was left facing the trip solo. I was hesitant to still attend, mending my own broken heart and slowly returning to normalcy, but against my fears I decided to go alone. I shortened the trip, left the dog at home (regrettably), and flew. I thought a few days alone at the beach before the wedding would heal me, as the ocean for me usually does. I had never traveled solo, and had enough travel under my belt that I thought it would be a good opportunity for me to face that fear in an easy trip to the Golden State. 

I love being alone, I love taking myself out to eat, alone. I like to run my errands and go to the museum by myself. Parking my ass in a bar stool for a cocktail and a quick conversation with a stranger I’ll never see again. I don’t like the pressure of someone else’s timeline or to worry about keeping up a conversation I don’t want, or if they think I’m taking too long looking at things. I hate being rushed, almost as much as I hate waiting around. My idea of a perfect day out is a long dog walk and treating myself with a coffee to go and laying at the park reading for hours. I was afraid of being alone in a new place, but I took this trip to California as an opportunity to really enjoy that time to clear my head, to fart around town with no ties, no memories, and no real itinerary besides the wedding. My life is on the brink of so much change, and I was ready for a break. 

The day before the wedding I linked up with a few friends who were also in town for the wedding,we shared an air b n b. The night before a girl friend and I were out together, having the time of our lives sharing oysters and dancing to the intermission music at a dive bar before we both headed home. I don’t drink much anymore so I’d consider myself a light weight. I woke up the next morning to the all too familiar hang-xiety I always feel from a night out despite if I did anything wrong or not. My friend laughed and explained how I ate an english muffin I toasted directly on the gas range with a piece of cheese like I was an old woman roasting poblanos, while I simultaneously complained about how angry I was at men and how I wished my english muffin was actually Taco Bell. Then I went to bed and fell asleep with a cookie in my hand. I apologized for my foggy memory of it all and possibly (probably) unwanted rant. He told me not to feel bad, that I had some good points, about both matters. 

I guess I need to be entirely clear on my stance as far as men go before I’m just another angry feminist. (Which I am, but…) Women have worked so hard to put themselves into a man's space. We are naming our daughters more masculine names, raising them to join work spaces that are male dominated, women are pushing for equality every single day, and they’re getting into spaces that years ago would have been unheard of. More and more men are showing up and supporting that fight. But, I want the same thing for men, I want sons to be born with female names, I want them to be raised in a culture where they can work in female dominated spaces, I want people to use whatever bathroom they want without a side eye, I want people to comfortably hand over their ID’s to me or start a tab at my bar without quietly asking me to not say their name too loud because they don’t identify with it anymore. I want people to be able to be whoever the hell they want to be. I want people to feel safe. I just don’t want men to be the blueprint, I want the worlds to fuse together. I know a lot of good men, I love men, I want men to be able to experience the softer parts of life that have been so long looked down on. I want men to have paternity leave as long as their wives, I want men to be able to cry and talk about working through how they’re feeling, I want them to get pedicures and facials because every human deserves to feel pampered. I want us all to have an equal opportunity in our day to day in a world that is already so cruel. I want a basic common decency and respect between all genders and identities. 

The morning I landed in California I had 6 hours to kill before I could check into my air b n b. The beginning of my solo days before the wedding. I got breakfast and a coffee and wrote my morning pages. I had gotten a message on my social media from my first middle school boyfriend. I had messaged him something weeks prior about how much his mom had meant to me because I had heard of her passing. He was seeing someone and we were now so far from each others type that it started out so sweet, like a wow-its-been-15-plus-years-how-the-hell-are-ya?!  Kind of a way. He quickly asked me if I was a lesbian based off of my pictures on Instagram, because none of my pictures were posted with a man. I said no, I’m straight. Immediately I wondered was it really because my life wasn’t centered around a man? Or was it because of my hair? My tattoos? My writing? There was nothing else more interesting about me that that’s all he had to ask me? Then I asked him if he meant based on judging me on my Instagram or if he thought that when we were kids. As if it even fucking mattered, I wish I hadn’t cared. He responded saying “Well I don’t know, I just knew you didn’t want to fuck me!” 

We were 13 years old, and that’s right, I didn’t want to. PERIOD. We were kids and I didn’t want to have sex and that is simply enough of a reason. His way of speaking about the past and about women we mutually had known in the past was incredibly childish. I was so appalled by that comment, I couldn’t help but continue a conversation out of pure curiosity but by simultaneously feeling disgusted? Like an accident where you can’t look away. This was a man who was once a kid, and sweet and kind, and maybe still was. But women and life hurt him along the way and he couldn’t be bothered to do the work to heal those parts of himself, instead he just talked poorly about women, he was the victim. I was hesitant in even writing this or publicly posting it, but isn’t that why we’re in this position in the first place? No one wants to address the problems for anyone's behavior, especially women. Women will protect a man's ego at all cost, when men usually could not be bothered. If a woman hurts them, the world will know about it, even their first girlfriend from fifteen years ago, while they are somehow left, blameless. There are two sides to every story. You and I both have been a victim and the perpetrator in our stories and someone else's. We don’t want to hurt feelings or make people look bad, but you know what? Maybe those people shouldn’t have done those things in the first place. Maybe they need to be called out. Maybe we don’t need to sit uncomfortably while men float around as if they’ve done nothing wrong. Maybe not just men, but all people need to deal with the consequences from their actions. This brief conversation really set the tone for the rest of my trip.

I finished up my pages and my coffee and was close enough to the beach and the strip of shops so I bopped around for a few hours. Eventually I found myself at a beach side bar, ordered a beer and went to the patio to read my book. A man sat down at my table without asking me. He was probably in his late 30’s to early 40’s. He told me my book was cool.  (I was reading off my kindle with a blank cover.) I looked at him, said thanks, and looked back at my book. I am no stranger to bars, or standing my ground with unwanted men. He proceeded to talk at me, told me how he loved football, was just signed onto the football team in Nevada (I don’t know much about football, but I still knew this wasn’t true), and how excited he was because he was able to order triple shots in the bars there instead of just doubles. I responded with one word answers, slammed my beer, and told him to have a nice day as I got up. He asked, “you don’t want to hang out?” I responded with a simple no. He called me a bitch as I walked away. 

I walked to the grocery store, changed into my swimsuit and a different set of clothes in the bathroom, and bought some sunblock. I walked by this funny little bar on my way to the beach that I decided to stop in for a second, to try my luck for a second chance to ask a bartender or some locals what they liked to do around here. I walked in to a man who was completely obliterated at the bar yelling about how he was the US’s top ford technician and no one really knew what that meant. He was clearly a regular who was receiving a break for his behavior. The woman behind the bar took a deep breath and loudly questioned why she still worked there. I laughed and told her I felt her pain, tipped her extra and again moved out to the patio. I asked a nice man on the patio if I could use his ashtray, he said of course and told me to let me know if that yelling man at the bar bothered me. I said thanks and laughed. Walked to the next table and of course belligerent ford tech followed me out there. Polite at first as always, I kindly asked him to go back to his seat. The man who had given me the ashtray interrupted him before he could argue and said, “Didn’t you hear the girl? Don’t be an asshole.” High five to kind ashtray man. As defeated Ford technician took his spot back at the bar. Again, I quickly left. Decided I’d spend the next few hours at the beach until I could check into my spot. 

After checking in, I relaxed and moseyed around town until I settled on a spot for dinner. I pulled up to a seat at the bar and began chatting with the bartender. I explained my experiences from earlier and he recommended a bar where most people were in my age range and it was the local spot for people who worked in the industry. Grateful, I made my way there after I finished up my dessert. Immediately as I sat down a guy came up to me and started talking. He was nice enough at first, he was from Russia and telling me about how he has only been to Colorado to visit Aspen and Vail for skiing. He asked if I had ever been there in which I responded no. He, as so many other people, were shocked to learn I had never skied or snowboarded in my life. As someone from Colorado, that is some made up sin that everyone who isn’t from here is appalled by, and feels the right to lecture me on. I kept matters short and explained it wasn’t in my budget. He laughed and told me that, “Being rich is a mindset.” I laughed back and responded with, “That’s an incredibly privileged thing to say!”  He was offended, and offered to buy me a drink since I didn’t seem to be able to afford it. I told him no, and asked him to go away if he was going to be an asshole. He scoffed but proceeded to do so. He lost his power move, he didn’t make me smaller than him.

Then I began talking with people at the bar, I was helping with a crossword, I was out of my element and having a good time! People came and went as seats shifted around. Towards the end of the night I ended up next to an older man who was so persistent in walking me home that I had lied over and over in an attempt to separate myself from him, and told him my friend and her boyfriend were waiting for me back at our hotel. He followed me to a different area of the bar, when I told him I was on my way out he insisted on walking me home because he had to leave as well. When I stalled and then changed my story that a friend was coming to meet me, he wanted to stay and meet them. 

Is this a fucking joke? Have men really interrupted and had the audacity to insert themselves into every part of my day because they just think they’re owed that? If women could learn how to harness that same audacity it would be over for them. 

The bar became loud and crowded. I asked him if he could buy me a drink, which he gladly obliged. As he became lost in the sea of people waiting to order, I booked it out of that bar as fast as I could. I cried my entire walk home, I wasn’t sad, I was angry. The rest of my solo trip I spent reading on the beach and going to bed early and avoiding people at all cost. Which is not the type of person I am when I’m out exploring somewhere, but I was left feeling powerless, that despite my confidence in my boundaries and self assertion when I’m uncomfortable, there were shitty men out there willing to push that for their own benefit.

Can I also throw in a side note that I know this shouldn’t matter, but in reality it does, I was wearing sweatpants and a sweater out to the bar. I already dress like this in fear of being bothered by men. Although I don’t consider myself unattractive, I am by no means a “bomb shell” and yet I still have to protect myself for a world I cannot control outside of myself. I don’t ever want a man to look at me, I don’t want them to invade my space, I am willing to be alone forever if I can avoid interactions like this ever again. I saw someone online recently stating that the fact that they were still attracted to men, proves that sexuality is not a choice. Although it’s funny, I felt that to my core. One teeny tiny glimpse of hope in all of this? All of the men I interacted closer to my age, were kind, and respectful, and didn’t want anything from me. Except some help with a crossword. I’m hopeful our generation is headed in a better direction. I'm hopeful that there are still places in this world where women can feel safe, now more so than in the past. I feel so lucky to work at a bar where the majority of the staff are men, yet we ask men to leave if they are being pushy or if a woman has one small complaint. We trust women, and we listen to them, and they don’t abuse that power. 

Women can never win, we stand up for ourselves, we're labeled a bitch, we keep quiet and we’re a pushover. It’s something that I have to accept on the surface or else I will spiral into a miserable pit of hopelessness. So yes, once I got drunk and had the safe space of a friend to listen to me, I was mad at men, I was really angry. I’m still angry. You should be too. I’m not here to do the work for you if you’re a man and any of this resonated with you, if it resonated with you, maybe that’s your sign to do your own internal work. If you were offended by any of this, or bothered by my opinions, you’re absolutely someone who is the problem. Women are not put on this planet to serve as a personal healer for a person who isn’t willing to do that for themselves. Even though that’s what patriarchy has enforced time and time again. As I’m obsessed with the new song by Hailey Orion, if this all makes me an angry woman, what does that make you?