I thought the good friend test was who do I tell that I got a job at Harvard. But I ended up telling everyone. Then I thought maybe the good friend test was who can I reach out to when I’m having a total breakdown? But again, the answer is everyone, because no one solo person can actually deal with me calling them, repeatedly, so I have to just tell you all, here on my blog. Read more
I don’t make Nino pay child support and I pay him back for almost all the money he spends when he’s with the kids. He just sent me an accounting for all the times I haven’t paid him back in 15 years. I owe him $8540. I told him he has to wait because I’m currently being evicted from an apartment I love, and if I kill myself over being evicted and people see I just paid Nino they might think I killed myself because of him.
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When I announced I’m doing research about autism at Harvard, people said, Academia requires too much patience! You’ll lose your mind!
Undaunted I came up with a new paper every week for the first year. The papers were awful, but as a writer I didn’t mind writing to learn. So it turned out that my transition to academia was, indeed, an exercise in extreme patience: for my co-authors. Read more
In the 70s my family’s knowledge of plastic exceeded our knowledge of gerbils, so we bought two girl gerbils and a plastic Habitrail cage because it didn’t look like a cage at all. The two girls made babies, and started eating them. We thought that meant the cage was too small, so we bought more Habitrail stuff. Read more
After 20 years of blogging, learning to do academic research was a steep learning curve. People told me to ask for help from professors at Harvard because they’d feel obligated to help me because I’m at Harvard as well. In fact most did not even feel obligated to reply to my email. But Claudia replied.
Golden Ladders, installation by Yoko Ono
I’m scared to talk about my job at Harvard because of imposter syndrome. But I know from experience that writing here and talking about myself incessantly is the way to beat it.
I still have not seen a video of the towers falling. But I started reading commentary about it this past year.
I have never stopped thinking about the people jumping from the towers. Maybe because after the second plane hit, my brain couldn’t comprehend anything really, it was all abstract and unreal. But when my coworker told me “People are jumping from the building!” that’s when I understood it was real. And I followed her to go see. Read more
There are some people I’ve been coaching since they were in high school. Usually their parents pay for the first few sessions and then I get overinvested in the kid.
So I have to stop and ask myself: “Does this family have $30,000 for me to coach the kid for a year?”
Sometimes the answer is yes, and then my rent is on time for so many months in a row that the landlord stops by to see if I got married. Read more
Below is a comment from my last post about the Wikipedia editor who kept trolls from deleting my page.
I know you have no reason to believe this, but I’m Agent 86. I haven’t followed your blog or been on Wikipedia in years. In fact, not trying to be rude, I had forgotten about you and all the other bloggers I used to follow because I just don’t follow blogs anymore. However, the other day I was reminded about you and told to check you out again. So I did and saw…this?!? I kind of freaked out at first, because I thought someone I knew had figured out my editing history. Whew – with further investigation I realized it was an amazing coincidence.
I had forgotten all about the attempts to delete the article about you. After seeing this post I went to look at it and the Talk page. Wow, did I get involved. Hard to believe that I was once so passionate about editing Wikipedia. Now I could care less – maybe I got a life? It was fun to re-read those posts. I am also a bit gobsmacked that there was a *fourth* AfD. If I still edited, for what it’s worth I’d would have put in yet another vote of support.
Anyhow, whether you believe I’m me or not, I’m quite chuffed to get a nod from you. Thank you!! <3 I really did enjoy your blog back in the day, and it was really nice to catch up – as far as I knew, you were still in Wisconsin!
cheers :-)
At first I wasn’t certain it was THE Agent 86. But then they left a link to my blog on their personal Wikipedia page, which was so special to me because I’ve been stalking that page forever trying to figure out who they are.
Reading that comment makes me think about how this was really just one moment in this person’s life. They were really involved in Wikipedia and then they weren’t. But during that time when they stood up for me, it made a huge difference in my life.
I never would have had the guts to edit my Wikipedia page and argue about it if I had not seen Agent 86 do it first. For a decade people said I’m too stupid to be on Wikipedia filled the editorial section with rants about my family, and calls to former employers, (and you can imaging how far back in my history they were going to find someone who would hire me before they saw my Wikipedia page). Agent 86ֶ gave such calm, logical, replies. Their editorial authority was like a wolf scaring off raccoons.
I am so so so happy that Six Sex Scenes has its own page on Wikipedia. I like knowing that I made a small contribution to the history of literature. Of course there are already people clamoring to take down the Six Sex Scenes page. But there’s a new editor defending my writing now. Lejil. And I appreciate reading their replies.
It’s much easier for me to stand up for someone else than to stand up for myself. Maybe this is true of everyone. I know a lot of people would prefer to sell a company or a product or idea — anything but themselves. Maybe we need to hear someone else stand up for us before we can do it for ourselves.
When Z was about ten years old and we had a layover in Minneapolis and went into a store because Z wanted to test makeup. I was nearby but not paying attention. He came over to me and said the woman working there told him makeup is for girls, not boys.
I comforted him, but I quickly shifted from comforting to outrage. He asked me not to say anything. “Please don’t make trouble,” he said.
I told him to wait outside the store and I would just explain to her that of course anyone can wear makeup. Then I went back in and ripped her head off for shaming my kid.
I went back to Z and he said, “That was great, Mom. I got a picture.” I kept the picture to remind me how important it is to stick up for my kids because it gives them power for the next time. I didn’t realize that the same is true for me. Each of us needs someone to stick up for us sometimes. It’s a special person who is looking for opportunities to stick up for people other than their own kids.
