there's a boy in my stocking!

(habits are hard to break.  the title of this post was going to be 'Ding's 1st Christmas - With a BOY.')

Remember all those holidays I spent complaining about LTF's lack of will when it came to spending time with me when I finally had the time? Remember those posts dithering about some vague desire I had to give him a holiday gift? (The most I ever mustered was a Christmas card.)

Well, this time I get to spend a real Christmas with a real dude, and not some frakked up facsimile thereof.

He's spending Christmas Eve with his family; I'm spending it with a friend's family. (Happy Birthday, mom.)
Then we'll be together for Christmas to exchange gifts, watch movies and grab Chinese food.  My perfect holiday.

I used to laugh at my sister every holiday as she'd dump a pile of gift-wrapped boxes at her husband's feet when they were dating in college; I thought she was a tool of the patriarchy.  Now I laugh at myself as I wander Michigan Avenue trying to calculate his shirt size or whether he'll prefer cotton PJs to flannel. The universe played a joke on me and I have to give it props for its timing.

Navigating this new relationship, and the various ripples from it, makes me think about the progress I've made as a result of those two years of coaching and therapy.  I'm so glad I went through that process.  (I really can't recommend it enough.)  I was feeling stuck and was just emerging from the fog of my mother's death.  The progress since then may look tiny, but it's significant to me.  From being blocked, guarded, defensive and numb to where I am now - autonomous, independent again, working to be present, checking in with myself, being more clear-eyed about what it is that I really value and what I need.  Moving past B-/LTF.

Of course, these are 'first-world' problems; who else has such luxury to navel gaze? 

But I'm proud of the internal progress I've made.  Maybe 'Kick Ass' isn't such a bad resolution after all.

Merry Merry to all my 11 readers - thanks for sticking around this long!

unmasking Ding

some things will be changing around here.

if anyone follows me on Twitter (or pays attention here) you'll notice that my pseudonymity is just about to disappear. i've decided that i've been hiding my professional light under a bushel for long enough and if i'm going to start going after what i want, i need to start pushing my 'personal brand.' sigh.

for years, Ding/ChurchGal has been a 'brand' of sorts, but i can't really take advantage of that as 'Ding' forever, you know? it would be like walking around in a cowl and hood.

so...this means that Screed will start migrating some of the personal stuff to another place. (can't really build a reputation on swooning over the boyfriend, you know?)

if you want to follow my Tweets, you can still do so here.

what was my new year's resolution a few years ago? Make An Effort.

this year, i'll add to that: Make An Effort and Be Ambitious.

Or maybe the other way around: Be Ambitious and Make the Effort.

or maybe i'll just condense it: Kick Ass.

sigh: i might as well be killed by a terrorist

Marriage eludes high-achieving black women - msnbc.com

apparently, my 'marriage market' has 'deteriorated' to such an extent i, and sisters like me, are doomed to singleness forever.

we're DOOMED, i tell you.

how come all these articles like this are about black women? how doomed are my high achieving asian girl friends? my over educated latina sisters? huh? why come all this pathologizing of the black women?

hmph.

looks like M- is my ticket out of spinsterhood.

(just kidding, M-! just kidding! kinda.)

since my visit with my family last week, there's been a post floating around my head about the community i come from, the religious community i come from and both those communities' inability to address family abuse (both physical and sexual) - and how that refusal ripples outward, creating more and more shit.

but, of course, i'm a little swamped right now.

and it's frakking 2 degrees in chicago.

brr.

but this one is coming up. soon.

Power to the Sheeple

[in BossLady’s office]

BL: Ding, I got your presentation. I LOVE it! It’s great! It’s well-researched, thought out, love the strategy…

D: Great!

BL: But…it’s too informative.

D: What??

BL: It’s not going to work. It’s…going to scare the crap out of them. You’re going to start a panic.

D: Have they seen the news??

BL: Well…you know that, I know that. But you have to understand… They can’t handle this kind of thing. You want to manage people, don't you?

D: Uh, no. Not if it means catering to idiots who need to be treated like they're brain-damaged.

BL: Well, that's who we have. They think they want to know, but they really don't. Let me just show you what I think needs to be taken out. It's not a lot. [crossing out a few slides about how bad and disastrous our state deficit is]

D: What?! But-but that’s what the presentation is about! You can’t get rid of that! It’s on the news, in the papers, every policy wonk in the state releases a report about our numbers. They can’t handle policy??!

BL: (sigh) These aren’t directors; these are middle managers. They are sheep. They won’t know how to handle this information so we need to manage it for them. [crossing out a slide of message points]

D: Oh, no, I have to TOTALLY disagree with that. If we are supposed to be asking them to help us fight for a better state budget, we need to give them the tools! Otherwise, what’s the point of this presentation? ‘Uh, the state budget is bad but I can’t tell you how bad or how to talk about it.’ What the fuck??

BL: Ok, ok. You have a point. I guess it can stay. But this has to go. [crossing out phrase ‘uninformed public.’] This is them. Can’t say this.

D: But we can call them sheep. Niice. I thought we were about empowering women. How can we empower staff, ask them to perform for us, but not trust them with what we know or trust them to be rational adults? What about giving everyone the benefit of the doubt and treating them like equals?

BL: (wince) Yeah...no. We actually set the bar a little lower than equal.

D: But they’re our Leadership council! Being a leader is about responsibility and trust – but we don’t trust them? What's this group for? And how come I'm not on it?

BL: Senior management realizes now that this was probably a mis-named group.

D: Jesus.