Friday, May 6, 2011
Couponing
I've recently become fascinated with couponing. I am going to be 35 years old this year and it had never really sunk in before that I can use a coupon to save money on a desired item at the grocery store. And I'm not rich. I've never been rich. But I've always pretty much ignored the coupons in the newspaper that I could have cut out and used. The other night I saw a show on TLC entitled "Extreme Couponing" on which people saved THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS on groceries for themselves and their families. I am now a believer. The other day I went to Safeway and used two coupons to receive discounts on toilet paper and soy milk. It felt good. And naughty. I felt a real rush when I handed the cashier my slips of paper - my COUPONS - and he happily gave me my discount rather than giving me a lecture on how I was taking away coupons from people who REALLY need them because I'm a lazy, good-for-nothing delinquent who rebels against societal norms by not paying full price for everything at the store. (I don't know where this guilt on my part is coming from.) Coupons are like a sale and I love sales. I look for sales. Why not look more consciously for coupons? Why should I pay full price for broccolli if I don't have to? Why not use my coupon for whole wheat pasta if I've got it? Saving money in a recession is definitely revolutionary act and I would encourage anyone to take what you can get when you can get it. Survival, baby.
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
My Mother and Angela Davis Made Me A Revolutionary
My mother made me a revolutionary. She did this by, among other things, having a copy of The Autobiography of Angela Davis on our bookshelf at home. Just having a book lying around was enough to set the course of my life.
I remember the day I discovered it wedged in between all of the Georgette Heyer romance novels that my mother adored reading. (I briefly went through a period where I was reading romance novels as well.) I was enamoured with the black woman with the afro on the cover, but had never opened it before. Then one day when I was around twelve or thirteen I decided to. My world changed. As I read I realized that a black woman could be a powerful force. A black woman could be a Black Panther and a philosopher and a college professor and also be on the America's Most Wanted List. A black woman could fight for her rights, and the rights of others, with strength and dignity. A black woman could SPEAK. I don't know why I didn't know it before. I was fascinated by Angela Davis' narrative about her time at the House of D and the way she was treated while awaiting trial for a crime she didn't commit. I just didn't KNOW the statistics of black people in correctional facilities until Angela Davis told me; I didn't know that slavery had taken on this new insidious form. How could I not have known? I'd never been associated with anyone who had been in prison. Incarcerated people were the invisible; Angela Davis made them visible to me and from that point on I really couldn't pretend that they weren't there.
Sometime around thirteen I learned the term 'political prisoner' and it's a term that resonates for me still now. To be imprisoned for one's beliefs and for acting one's beliefs, but to keep believing and acting on them anyway. To be brave enough to be who you are. To be brave enough to fight for what you know is right. To suffer for the greater good. To speak out against oppression and suffering. That's something.
Later while I was Yale as a undergrad Angela Davis came to speak and I was reminded of how much she moved me when I was just becoming a teenager. There she was, this FORCE - this WOMAN - who spoke with an eloquence and a strength and warm that filled me with a sense of purpose. She hardly seemed real and yet there she was. Her words rocked me to my core. Words and the ability to speak them is some powerful stuff. Words can really change lives.
After I graduated college I became involved with Rehabilation Through the Arts...and so it began, this journey I'm on...
I remember the day I discovered it wedged in between all of the Georgette Heyer romance novels that my mother adored reading. (I briefly went through a period where I was reading romance novels as well.) I was enamoured with the black woman with the afro on the cover, but had never opened it before. Then one day when I was around twelve or thirteen I decided to. My world changed. As I read I realized that a black woman could be a powerful force. A black woman could be a Black Panther and a philosopher and a college professor and also be on the America's Most Wanted List. A black woman could fight for her rights, and the rights of others, with strength and dignity. A black woman could SPEAK. I don't know why I didn't know it before. I was fascinated by Angela Davis' narrative about her time at the House of D and the way she was treated while awaiting trial for a crime she didn't commit. I just didn't KNOW the statistics of black people in correctional facilities until Angela Davis told me; I didn't know that slavery had taken on this new insidious form. How could I not have known? I'd never been associated with anyone who had been in prison. Incarcerated people were the invisible; Angela Davis made them visible to me and from that point on I really couldn't pretend that they weren't there.
Sometime around thirteen I learned the term 'political prisoner' and it's a term that resonates for me still now. To be imprisoned for one's beliefs and for acting one's beliefs, but to keep believing and acting on them anyway. To be brave enough to be who you are. To be brave enough to fight for what you know is right. To suffer for the greater good. To speak out against oppression and suffering. That's something.
Later while I was Yale as a undergrad Angela Davis came to speak and I was reminded of how much she moved me when I was just becoming a teenager. There she was, this FORCE - this WOMAN - who spoke with an eloquence and a strength and warm that filled me with a sense of purpose. She hardly seemed real and yet there she was. Her words rocked me to my core. Words and the ability to speak them is some powerful stuff. Words can really change lives.
After I graduated college I became involved with Rehabilation Through the Arts...and so it began, this journey I'm on...
Sunday, May 1, 2011
The N-Word And Art
I have been struggling with the use of this word within the context of plays, books and films. Recently I attended a meeting in which a group of people spoke of the impact of this word in a play. It should be noted that it was mostly a group of white people with myself and another black woman being the only representatives of the black community within this conversation. The general feeling was one of discomfort at having the hear that hateful word, but there was also a sense of needing to justify its use because of the historical time period in which the play is set. Nobody wants to censor ART, as it were. And yet. I am troubled. I have never been an advocate of censoring art. I am, in fact, an artist. How do we as artists deal with presenting work that causes others pain? That causes ourselves pain? And I don't simply mean discomfort. I mean PAIN. Humiliation. Rage. I can't think of an equivalent word in the English language to the N-word.
There was talk of the use of this word within art being a "teaching moment". But for who? As a black person, I don't know that I need to be taught this lesson over and over again. I know that the word is wrong. I know what is feels like to be called 'that word'. Just the thought of it is enough to bring me to tears of rage and resentment. I am ambivalent about introducing black children to a narrative that places them lower than others. It feels like we, as educators and artists, are saying, "Look. This is who you were. This is who you are." As a black woman, I wonder how one turn that around and makes it a moment in which a black child can feel good about themselves? It's one thing to hear that word in reference to another race. It's another thing to hear that word in reference to YOUR race. It's a real rabbit hole of despair when I think of all of the American literary "classics" that contain that word. Here I am, trying to find a way into the story and suddenly I am told, as a black female reader, that I'm on the periphery, the edges, and I don't matter at all. Suddenly I can't identify with the main character, but am instead tracking all of the black people who hover around, the angry, or downtrodden, or trifling Negroes who the white people talk about as IDEAS or SYMBOLS more than actual persons. I recently read "The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter" and was struck by the positioning of the black people in that narrative. I don't know if I was OFFENDED exactly, but I certainly was left with a lot of lingering questions and a certain discomfort.
There was talk around this table of mental and emotional explorers (all of whom were brave enough to attend) of the N-word being used frequently within hip hop culture. I'm not exactly sure why this point was made. Not ALL hip hop music utilizes this word, just like all hip hop music doesn't refer to women in a derogatory way. Several people (several WHITE people) said that it was okay for black people to call other black people that word, but that a white person cannot use that word. (I appreciate being given 'permission' to say what I want to people of my own race by people of another race.) While I believe that it's true that a white person cannot use that word, I think it's a fallacy to suggest that black people call each other that. I don't use that word and I won't let anybody call me that. It doesn't make me feel good about myself. I don't care who you are. Calling me that is one quick way to start a fight. I'm not of the school of thought that says it can be used as a term of endearment or affection. But I also don't call my female friends "sluts" or "bitches" when I'm trying to be affectionate. To me it feels like a strange version of self-loathing. To call someone the N-word to be affectionate feels like saying, "I love you, but I also hate you." It's awkward and falls out of my mouth awkwardly. If it falls out at all which it doesn't.
So how do we as artists deal with this hateful word? I don't know. How do we avoid alienating people by referring to them as less than within the scope of a theatrical or literary piece? Do we simply accept the fact that some things are for a particular audience? Do we accept that nothing is universal and that there is always a group that's going to be left high and dry and recognize that sometimes that group is going to be YOU? How do we as artists deal with the fact that in order to create art we have to sometimes be ruthless and hurt people to their very cores? Art is generally not NICE; it's as human as humans are. It's messy and offensive and powerful and challenging and pathetic and unfair and sometimes, just sometimes, beautiful. I wonder: do I need to work on embracing that word the way I would embrace someone who hurt me - with empathy and forgiveness? Is that my role as an active art consumer? Something to continue pondering...
There was talk of the use of this word within art being a "teaching moment". But for who? As a black person, I don't know that I need to be taught this lesson over and over again. I know that the word is wrong. I know what is feels like to be called 'that word'. Just the thought of it is enough to bring me to tears of rage and resentment. I am ambivalent about introducing black children to a narrative that places them lower than others. It feels like we, as educators and artists, are saying, "Look. This is who you were. This is who you are." As a black woman, I wonder how one turn that around and makes it a moment in which a black child can feel good about themselves? It's one thing to hear that word in reference to another race. It's another thing to hear that word in reference to YOUR race. It's a real rabbit hole of despair when I think of all of the American literary "classics" that contain that word. Here I am, trying to find a way into the story and suddenly I am told, as a black female reader, that I'm on the periphery, the edges, and I don't matter at all. Suddenly I can't identify with the main character, but am instead tracking all of the black people who hover around, the angry, or downtrodden, or trifling Negroes who the white people talk about as IDEAS or SYMBOLS more than actual persons. I recently read "The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter" and was struck by the positioning of the black people in that narrative. I don't know if I was OFFENDED exactly, but I certainly was left with a lot of lingering questions and a certain discomfort.
There was talk around this table of mental and emotional explorers (all of whom were brave enough to attend) of the N-word being used frequently within hip hop culture. I'm not exactly sure why this point was made. Not ALL hip hop music utilizes this word, just like all hip hop music doesn't refer to women in a derogatory way. Several people (several WHITE people) said that it was okay for black people to call other black people that word, but that a white person cannot use that word. (I appreciate being given 'permission' to say what I want to people of my own race by people of another race.) While I believe that it's true that a white person cannot use that word, I think it's a fallacy to suggest that black people call each other that. I don't use that word and I won't let anybody call me that. It doesn't make me feel good about myself. I don't care who you are. Calling me that is one quick way to start a fight. I'm not of the school of thought that says it can be used as a term of endearment or affection. But I also don't call my female friends "sluts" or "bitches" when I'm trying to be affectionate. To me it feels like a strange version of self-loathing. To call someone the N-word to be affectionate feels like saying, "I love you, but I also hate you." It's awkward and falls out of my mouth awkwardly. If it falls out at all which it doesn't.
So how do we as artists deal with this hateful word? I don't know. How do we avoid alienating people by referring to them as less than within the scope of a theatrical or literary piece? Do we simply accept the fact that some things are for a particular audience? Do we accept that nothing is universal and that there is always a group that's going to be left high and dry and recognize that sometimes that group is going to be YOU? How do we as artists deal with the fact that in order to create art we have to sometimes be ruthless and hurt people to their very cores? Art is generally not NICE; it's as human as humans are. It's messy and offensive and powerful and challenging and pathetic and unfair and sometimes, just sometimes, beautiful. I wonder: do I need to work on embracing that word the way I would embrace someone who hurt me - with empathy and forgiveness? Is that my role as an active art consumer? Something to continue pondering...
Saturday, April 30, 2011
Ashland Food Bank
Is there a can of Wolfgang Puck's corn chowder that taunts you every time you open your kitchen cabinet? There's one in mine. It's been in there for a countless number of months and I keep thinking that I should open it and eat it, but I can't seem to bring myself to do it. I also can't bring myself to throw it out because I don't believe in wasting food. Should I just open it, heat it up and hope for the best, even though I'm not altogether sure what compelled me to buy a can of corn chowder since I don't generally eat chowder of any kind? Or should I donate it to a food bank? Along with all of the other things in my cabinets that I may eat one day when I'm down to my last quarter and have no other option. Maybe, along with the corn chowder I'll donate the packets of instant oatmeal that I'll probably never eat and the tomato paste I'm not sure how I got and the box of couscous that has been on shelf for over a year. Couscous with pine nuts. Why do we collect food that we're never going to eat? Isn't it better to donate certain items to people who might actually enjoy them? I wonder if there's a person out there who dreams daily of enjoying a bowl of corn chowder but just doesn't have the money to spend on such a thing. Why am I depriving this person of the joy of eating something that they dream about eating?
Think about donating food to your local food bank that might be more useful in someone else's cabinet. Or think about donating time at your local food bank. Right now I'm in Ashland, Oregon so I'm going to list the website for the food bank there, but there are food banks everywhere and it's a good place to go to donate food or time - it's also a good place to go if you need food, especially cans of corn chowder.
The Ashland Food Project is the local food bank in Ashland, Oregon. Check it out at http://ashlandfoodproject.com/VolOpportunities.html.
Think about donating food to your local food bank that might be more useful in someone else's cabinet. Or think about donating time at your local food bank. Right now I'm in Ashland, Oregon so I'm going to list the website for the food bank there, but there are food banks everywhere and it's a good place to go to donate food or time - it's also a good place to go if you need food, especially cans of corn chowder.
The Ashland Food Project is the local food bank in Ashland, Oregon. Check it out at http://ashlandfoodproject.com/VolOpportunities.html.
Friday, April 29, 2011
52nd Street Project
The 52nd Street Project is a non-profit organization that brings kids from Hell's Kitchen (NYC) together with theatre professionals to create their own works of theatre. If you are a theatre professional or simply fancy yourself to be an 'artistic sort', this is an amazing organization to volunteer for. The things that they can do with foam core! I became involved with the 52nd Street Project via New Haven, CT when I was still a Yale undergrad. It was called the Dwight Edgewood Project when I was involved. I remember being an actress in a ten-minute play about a bank robbery (or something like that). What I remember more is the delighted look on the young playwright's face when she saw her play produced by a bunch of enthusiastic adults. I think I can still just hear her shrieks of laughter. At one point I also stage managed an evening of plays for the Dwight Edgewood Project and helped build sets. Later I was connected with a 12 year old girl and after speaking with her for a bit, I wrote a play that I thought she might like about a monster and a dollbaby. There was a song in it, too. For several days I, this little girl and several other adult-child pairs went away for a retreat to rehearse our two-person plays. Then we performed these plays in front of an audience. Soooo fun and rewarding.
In New York I took a few afternoons to volunteer to help with homework at the 52nd Street Project headquarters and I really enjoyed it, even though I was consistently reminded of how much I've forgotten about middle and high school math. Math is HARD. But the granola bars the staff provided were YUMMY.
ANYHOO, check out the 52nd Street Project if you want to use your artistic talents and / or rusty school skills to help out a bunch of great kids. Check out their website at http://www.52project.org/?s=&cat=5.
In New York I took a few afternoons to volunteer to help with homework at the 52nd Street Project headquarters and I really enjoyed it, even though I was consistently reminded of how much I've forgotten about middle and high school math. Math is HARD. But the granola bars the staff provided were YUMMY.
ANYHOO, check out the 52nd Street Project if you want to use your artistic talents and / or rusty school skills to help out a bunch of great kids. Check out their website at http://www.52project.org/?s=&cat=5.
Thursday, April 28, 2011
HEIFER INTERNATIONAL
A couple of years ago I was given a goat for Christmas and I was beyond excited. I remember putting down my glass of wine, opening up the envelope that I thought would contain a card from my beloved friends, and being really moved when I saw that they'd given me a goat. Well, a share of a goat. Who doesn't want a goat, especially one that you don't have to feed and take care of? Who doesn't want to feel unselfishly good about receiving a gift? So much of my life is spent feeling guilty about how selfish I am and now here was a moment of reprieve from that. Now if my friends had given me an ACTUAL goat it may have been a problem since at the time I lived in a small NYC apartment that I shared with a cat and a dog. All of my furniture would have been chewed, my animals would have unhappy and I would have been really unhappy - even though I may gotten some goat milk and goat cheese (yummy) out of the whole thing. I named my goat Sam and I still think of him fondly. Sam? Sam? Can you hear me?
Through Heifer International you can give a goat, a flock of chickens, a WATER BUFFALO or a heiffer as a gift and no one can say that you didn't get them something special.
Check out their website at http://www.heifer.org/site/c.edJRKQNiFiG/b.195980/.
Through Heifer International you can give a goat, a flock of chickens, a WATER BUFFALO or a heiffer as a gift and no one can say that you didn't get them something special.
Check out their website at http://www.heifer.org/site/c.edJRKQNiFiG/b.195980/.
GEMS
I saw a documentary several months ago that really moved me called "Very Young Girls" about teenagers who are victims of sexual exploitation. The average age for a girl to enter a life of prostitution in the United States is thirteen. Thirteen! They're usually in abusive families and are easy prey for pimps who want to make a profit off of their innocence and their deep desire for love and approval. I was deeply struck by how difficult it can be for these girls - babies really - to leave the "life" and re-gain a sense of their own worth. They're recruited and brainwashed by abusive pimps. They're arrested for prostitution even though many of them are legally too young to consent to sex which means that they are rape victims. Some of the victims of sexual exploitation are so psychologically damaged that they can't see any other way to live. Child exploitation is another disgusting form of child abuse; pimps and the men who buy these girls should be punished to the full extent of the law. Rachel Lloyd, the founder of GEMS, is a crusader who's really making a difference; I respect the work she and her staff do tremendously. GEMS stands for Girls Educational and Mentoring Services and is a New York City organization that helps victimized girls escape their pimps and make a fresh start. For more information on GEMS and ways to help, go to http://www.gems-girls.org/. You might also netflix "Very Young Girls". This is a devastating problem in our country and needs to be dealt with.
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Rehabilitation Through The Arts
I've really been thinking a lot lately about Rehabilitation Through the Arts, the volunteer program I became involved with in 2001. It began with me agreeing to play a part in a show at Sing Sing Correctional Facility and ended with me changing the course of my life. The members of RTA - both incarcerated and non-incarcerated - worked together to perform a stage adaptation of the film "Slam" (written by and starring Saul Williams, among other noted slam poets of the 1990s). I was in my early 20s and had never met someone who'd been in prison, let alone been inside of a maximum-security correctional facility. It was sooo scary - but so great. So life changing! I moved from being an actress to becoming an activist. It's been a long time since I've seen the men - and women - who make up RTA, but I'm eternally grateful to the people who really taught me what empathy, forgiveness, family, strength and humanity is all about. If you're interested in checking out the work of this fascinating organization, go to http://www.p-c-i.org/. Rehabilitation Through the Arts is under the umbrella organization Prison Communities International which works to provide artistic programming to aid in the emotional, mental and spiritual growth of incarcerated individuals.
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