No smile, no sneer

On my way to the deck this morning, as I strolled along Wale into Adderley, a man introduced himself as Luke, and suggested we spend some time together in his "limousine back at home". I was overcome by a sudden urge to punch him in the face. Usually I tolerate the advances and the innuendo and the not so subtle requests for sex, but I this morning I had no patience. None.

I went to a "Rape Awareness" workshop at the US Consulate a few weeks ago. I was expecting it to be horrendous but the new regional security officer knows his limitations and got an outside woman in to run the workshop and it was pretty good. The one thing she said, which I remembered this morning, was that "women, you don't need to be friendly. You don't need to reply, to respond. You don't need to smile." WOWZA! So this morning, I didn't smile. I was just sick of it.

"Oh, but what's a few words?" You may say, "just relax."
Yeah but, I'm kind of over relaxing. If you say hello to someone, and they don't say hello back, it means they don't want to talk to you. It means they don't consent to that conversation. I am forever being roped into conversations and situations that I don't consent to. I am forever having my body and my clothes and my hair commented on. I cut off my hair, almost all of it, and yet STILL men on the street find it necessary to share their opinion on my appearance and attire with me. You know what, I know what I look like, I don't need you to tell me.

I was livid this morning. Really. I wanted to turn around and shout at Luke, "what right do you have to make me uncomfortable? What right do you have to make me try and shift my bags so that when I walk in front of you you can't see my ass and pull a comment about what you'd like to do with it? What right do you have to make me feel like everything else that I am is totally undermined and invisible in those seconds and minutes that you tell me what you'd like to do with my body--because clearly that's all I am...?"

I'd reached boiling point, I guess. After days and weeks and months and years of hearing this kind of shit. Of being called at and spoken to and engaged in conversations that I just didn't consent to. I was furious. And then I wasn't.

I ignored him. I was indifferent.

See, the way I figure, offering someone emotion, whether it be love or kindness or anger or hate, recognizes that that person is a person. That they have humanity. That they share something with you, that when all is stripped away that they could be you. But when you're indifferent, when you ignore and give someone nothing: neither love nor hate, you deny them that personhood, that humanity. You deny them the opportunity to be loved and to be hated in the way that people are, you deny them the part of their being that they would otherwise share with you.

That's what I did this morning. I didn't punch him in the face, I just refused to recognize his personhood. Maybe that's wrong, maybe that makes it worse, but when you're fatigued by the world's insistence on inscribing it's power on your body--because that's what each of those little comments are; a mark seared into your skin--maybe it's forgivable.

I took a deep breath as I walked past the flower sellers and stopped to tap the toe of my shoe in a puddle of water and I love the way it splish-splashes so quickly and quietly. Breathe. It smells good here.