the clock is a mad jester in the playground of memory.

It's kind of interesting to do the same meme every year, and watch my answers change.

QUESTIONS FOR 2011

( Clicky for the questions. )

43. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:

The most tender place in my heart is for strangers
I know it's unkind, but my own blood is much too dangerous
Hangin' round the ceiling half the time, hangin' round the ceiling half the time

Compared to some I've been around, but I've really tried so hard
That echo chorus lied to me with its hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on.

In the end I was the mean girl, or somebody's in-between girl,
Now it's the devil I love.

I do not know how to process grief that is purely loss, and is not accompanied by the empowering forward motion footholds of relief or anger. It is so strange, and so bittersweet, and a difficult lesson on how to try to let go of want, a want for something that was not destructive, that made me a better, happier, kinder person, trying to find ways to hold on to the good elements and let the rest slip away.
 
In a way there is anger, not at a person but at the universe, a universe that seems to perpetually taunt me, holding out glimmering beautiful possible futures that shine like stars, nearly dropped into my outstretched palms, dreamed of, ached for, only to find when I try to close my fingers that they fall through a mist of unfulfilled wishes.
 
I’m trying so hard to not think myself unloveable, and I really wish that it was not the common theme in the demise of the largest number of my relationships. While a few have ended for other reasons, most of them are simply that the other person didn’t feel that love in the right way no matter how beautiful they found me to be, and it’s a never-ending battle to chalk so many of them up to coincidence.
 
I am beautiful and loveable and I hope someday the universe will allow me to feel that, warmed by the rays of another’s starshine instead of solely lit from within by my own. 

the wind today has lost that warm earthiness of autumn, trading it for the crisp crystalline scent of ice.  the years go by so much faster as they pass. 

This is a letter I'm going to send off, and link to, and hopefully broadcast in an attempt to get Wordpress to take action to enforce their own Terms of Service.  Please feel free to link, repost, forward, mail and any other spreading of the word you can do.  ♥


While the Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival (MWMF) is an event you may or may not usually concern yourself with, I wanted to bring to your attention an appalling violation of trans women’s privacy and safety that is happening in conjunction with the festival right now, and the refusal of blog website Wordpress to take any action to enforce their terms of service and protect a vulnerable population from harassment or worse.
 
I’ve never attended or really even cared about MWMF myself, but was aware from friends who have gone that there has been an ongoing controversy regarding the attendance of trans women. There are many trans women who love to go and bond with other women. There’s also a faction of MWMF attendees that feel the festival should be free of all persons born with penises and open to “womyn born womyn” only.
 
I don’t really want to get into the body-parts-based admission policies of the MWMF, however. What really disgusts me is a blog post related to this topic on the blog GenderTrender. (I'm not publicly linking to it in order to refrain from compromising the privacy of these women further). I find the post hateful in so many ways, the least of which is actually the blogger’s only "womyn-born-womyn" stance on the controversy. No, what is really disgusting is what she feels her opinion entitles her to do.
 
This blog post outs several trans women with both pseudonyms AND legal names, their photos, where they can be found at the festival, and in some cases their profession and employment. Being on this “hitlist” was not consented to by any of them, and it associates them with accusations of volatile behavior that the author has absolutely no proof any of them participated in. The blogger refuses to use female pronouns and asserts that these women, who live in one of the most marginalized segments of our society, are “chest pounding” and trying to assert male privilege in invading a womens’ space – as if women who’ve survived gender dysphoria and live outside of our binary ideas of gender have any male privilege to speak of. I can’t even fathom the kind of vulnerability and violation these women must feel. They’re now at risk for ongoing harassment from MWMF-goers, both online and in person at any future fests, and at risk of harassment and potentially violence from any other hateful person that happens to stumble on that post.
 
The blogger is also putting these people in possible professional peril - at least one woman is listed by both her legal name, profession, and business name AND by the stage name she uses as an actress in (feminist-award-winning, actually) adult films. Suddenly, anyone who googles her in a professional capacity becomes immediately aware of her other work, without any consent from her.
 
I know there are several people, myself included, that reported to Wordpress this gross violation of privacy AND the Wordpress Terms of Service, which states “By making Content available, you represent and warrant that…the Content does not contain threats or incite violence towards individuals or entities, and does not violate the privacy or publicity rights of any third party.” (http://en.wordpress.com/tos/)
 
Everyone who has made a report to Wordpress received a single paragraph canned reply that states:
 
“WordPress.com is in no position to arbitrate disputes or make judgment on such claims. As per http://en.support.wordpress.com/disputes/, please provide us with a Court Order including a court's decision regarding this particular content; if any content is found to be defamatory or illegal by a court of law, it will be removed immediately from our service. Any court order, should you obtain one, must be sent to the following e-mail address:court-orders@wordpress.com”
 
Even more than I was outraged at the blogger herself, I’m outraged at Wordpress. Absolutely they have the ability and the RESPONSIBILITY to enforce their terms of service. Absolutely they can tell a blogger she must remove photos used without permission. Absolutely they can insist that a blogger cannot out members of a vulnerable minority without consent. They DO NOT have to wait for a court of law to enforce their own Terms of Service.
 
Because Wordpress seems flatly uninterested in taking any action to protect these women, I thought I’d write to you. A good old-fashioned media shaming campaign might possibly make them take a hard look at their terrible policies of doing absolutely nothing to protect a vulnerable population and shirking their responsibility to ensure that their terms of service are followed..
 
Thank you for your time.

well. that was (mostly) fun while it lasted.  now for the next adventure in the queue.

 Because we all need it sometimes. ;) 

Post a comment, and I will reply with a reason why I think you're great. In return, you might like to post this same meme on your blog and comment for other people.

 most days now i entirely forget about you. you are irrelevant  to my plans, my loves, my hopes and wishes and you don't haunt my dreams.  not anymore.

but every once in awhile i'll see something really beautiful and my heart stops just for a moment, and i'll still wish you'd seen it too. shared, speechless, just holding my hand a little tighter, our own little language of connection i doubt i'll ever find again. 

 

Dear Governor Walker,

 Like many other state employees, I have spent significant time this morning reading and reviewing your email and related news items, and pondering its meaning for me and my coworkers. I realize that our state is having financial trouble, like every other government entity, many businesses, and many individual citizens during this difficult economic time, and that we all must make concessions and find ways to cope with the shortfalls.  This is especially difficult when you are looking at such a large workforce with such complex budgetary issues.

 However, I urge you to make sure that the policies outlined in your Budget Repair Bill are more nuanced than how they are outlined in this email.  I fear that these policies would create undue financial hardship for many state employees, myself included, and may cause a rather large turnover rate or a significant decrease in morale and productivity in our workforce.

 As an example, I will offer you my situation. 

 I currently work as an office operations associate. This classification offers me a base salary of $13.968 per hour or $29,053.44 per year as a base salary.  I am also a single parent; this salary supports a household of two people.  Currently, my salary and benefits package, even with furloughs that reduce my base salary to $28,255.49 ($29,053.44, minus $893.95 in furloughs plus $528 in unemployment compensation), is sufficient compensation to keep our household functioning independently of any aid or financial assistance, albeit in a rather frugal fashion.  While I appreciate our excellent benefits and having enough sick time to be able to take off both when my son is sick and when I am sick, I would not call myself a “have.”

 Your outlined proposal below would indicate that, in the future, I would be contributing a further $1,627 per year to my pension plan and approximately an additional $80 per month to my healthcare.  While this is not a reduction in my base salary, it would involve a reduction of my take-home pay, currently at  $1,838.33, by approximately $200 per month.   I don’t know if you’ve ever had to feed, house, clothe, and educate two people on $1,600 per month, but it is extremely difficult and every penny matters to us.

 More important to you, perhaps, than my individual situation is the fact that these cuts would not, I believe, actually be of any benefit financially to the state. 

 Firstly, I am 100% federally funded.  The money for my salary and benefits comes from  the federal Title I grant, and it is grant money that cannot be reappropriated to the state’s general fund.  I know it’s a difficult situation when making policy to differentiate between state employees by funding source, but in this instance it would make some employees’ home lives excessively dire for no benefit to the state. I also see that this type of differentiation is something you are willing to undertake, as certain types of unions have been exempted from this bill, so I urge you to also look to where these changes will be appropriate and where they will create no benefit.

 Secondly, the 9% drop in my overall compensation resulting in a significant reduction in my take-home pay would cause me to seek out assistance.  My income currently falls below the threshold level for a family of two in the state FoodShare benefit program. While I have not used it thus far as I currently do not require it, $200 a month is about three-quarters of our monthly food budget, and the hardship that the loss of this sum would cause would necessitate help for my family.  The state would end up picking up that tab – in addition to the money that is lost to the state in unemployment compensation on the days when I am furloughed (which, as stated above, my furlough days do not save the state general fund any money.)

 Thirdly, money funneled to my pension and health insurance is not taxable income.  This reduction in pay would put me, and many other state employees, in a lower tax bracket and will result in a loss of income for the state.  Less disposable income for tens of thousands of citizens at once may also have a profound effect on local economies, the success of businesses, and revenues from sales taxes, which impact both the state government budget and the health of the state’s economy at large.

 I urge you to consider, at the very least, a graded plan by base pay rate.  5.8% of your salary will not likely prevent you from eating, but for our family, it will.  I would like to see the percentage of the contribution to pension, and perhaps to healthcare, be linked to the base pay rate, or at the absolute minimum, for people under a certain pay rate threshold to have the ability to opt out of the increased pension contribution and simply accept a smaller pension fund rather than a serious reduction in our disposable income.  While I indeed took a state position partly because I knew that I would be saving appropriately for retirement, investments in my long-term future are not more important than my ability to feed and shelter my family in the immediate term.  I am also facing being stripped of my ability to collectively bargain to make sure that I do not have to make the choice between securing my future, obtaining healthcare, and taking care of my family in the present.

 I am certain it is not your intent to inflict such hardship on your employees, and it is hard to know the individual situations of the tens of thousands of people who will be affected.  I thought it may help to inform your decisions if you knew at least one, and help you to make changes and additions to your policy that will help the state act frugally without imposing undue hardship onto those who keep it running each day.

 Thank you for your time.

 

Mackenzie Dunn
Office Operations Associate, Title I and School Support Team
WI Department of Public Instruction

The text of the email sent to all state employees today: 

( The email from Scott Walker regarding the Budget Repair Bill )

And finally, the text of the email sent by the State Superintendent (which is an elected and not a position appointed by the governor) to our Department.  It really highlights the kind of every day culture here that is a huge part of why I love my job, and want to avoid leaving if I can.

( Email from Tony Evers, State Superintendent )

 

 Day One: Ten things you want to say to ten different people right now.
Day Two: Nine things about yourself.
Day Three: Eight ways to win your heart.
Day Four: Seven things that cross your mind a lot.
Day Five: Six things you wish you’d never done.
Day Six: Five people who mean a lot (in no order whatsoever)
Day Seven: Four turn-offs.
Day Eight: Three turn-ons.
Day Nine: Two images that describe your life right now, and why.
Day Ten: One confession.

This is hard, as I tend to be rather candid most of the time with most things, and the things I would have to "confess" are things I keep so secret I pretty much never tell them to anyone ever, and certainly can't imagine I'd divulge just because an lj meme asked me to.  So.. what's something most people don't know yet is not so private that I can tell it?

Perhaps my confession just that.  My truly true secrets are things I never tell, not anyone, not even the people who are the closest to me. There are so many things that no one will ever know about me.