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03.19.04 - 2:08 a.m.
"sexual evolution" last night i got in touch with my sexual inner child in the most unforeseeable fashion. the occassion? the first 'sille' holiday for my lecture class - "fashion victim day" - the prof's way of enacting that day's lesson [commodity fetishism], while enlivening an otherwise dry reading assignment. now i'm someone who usually resists dressing up for halloween. i'm sure it has so much to do with an uneasy self-acceptance issue. if i'm not comfortable with who i am, why exacerbate the insecurity with costumes that call attention to myself? in this instance, however, it was sort of my job to dress up and set a fun example. and so i decided that once i decided on my fetish item - a short, sleeveless, diamond-patterned chartreause-lime dress - i'd stick to it, even though march madness hit us with a foot of snow and a temperature drop to 27o F last night. to make the "assignment" even harder for myself, i decided to buy my first pair of black fishnet stockings, and went hunting at _evolution_ local clothing store that's the closest this town has to st. mark's place/8th avenue/broadway array of shoe, wigs, leather, boas, and all other things punk, goth, indie, and drag. tentative and excited as i felt before my first time skinny dipping at the beach in college, showcasing myself as the belle (or femme) of the ball that evening had me feeling nervous enough to bolt. what frightened me wasn't as much my curvy outline (i bought this dress 7 years and 15 lbs ago in spain), as it was shedding my conservative uniform and with it sexual image, which academe imposes on instructors. like i must have six tailored pants in the color black alone! solid dark colors like navy,black,and grey overwhelming make up the bulk of my wardrobe. i see how at a distance, veiling our academic bodies in dark clothing really creates this image that we instructors are merely heads detached from bodies, so that even i forget my own complicity in making my body invisible. last night though i had to make an entrance, and even stood up and twirled before the class when sille asked the t.a.s to show off their wares. maybe the fashion victim theme was supposed to encourage a gaudy or camp effect -- in other words, i expected the student to respond with laughter at me (and i was so prepared to join in). but instead, several people complimented me on how nice i looked...and i was just so caught off guard...it was as if they and i noticed publicly for the first time in this space that i do have a body (notably different in a university with warped racial demographics), and that mine was beautiful... maybe it's because lime green clothing might make some bodies look ill or unhealthy, and yet, i know my skin beams strikingly in these colors. [check out the african/american model showcasing banana republic's new spring line up of yellows and greens to know what i'm talking about banana republic ]
... ..and then when, at the close of class, one of my students asked if she could take a picture with herself, me, and sille i was so caught off-guard but pleasantly flattered...not just that some student's capturing this image for posterity, but because, by putting much more of myself, my playful, smiling, flirtateous - unserious - attitude with my students, that some of them actually like me. and, office hours today where i talked with two students together over an hour just made me feel so good. yes, i've come such a long way from wearing XXL grey sweatshirts to cover my body in blandness and my own shame. and my close friends know that i have no problem taking center stage in a private dance party... hell, last summer i bought my first backless tank top...which totally rocked by the way!!! but to strut like that publicly on campus, in an atmosphere i've struggled, demanded, inwardly pressured myself to project a serious, no bullshit, take me seriously dammit attitude - and then to recognize that i can whatever the hell i want and still be taken seriously - makes me want to go run back to evolution and buy funky multi-colored striped tights, long gloves, leather skirts, and all other funky items that just show off the erotic edginess that i've so feared would indemnify me, rather than help me be more free as i write tough marxian and freudian concepts at the chalkboard. the sex-in-the-little-uncity night continued with a celebratory drink at the martini bar/restraurant after lecture. increasingly, i've favored going out for drinks over staying in for tea and coffee with my buddies and i love the sexy feeling of coming into my own thirtysomethingness. i suppose again, i've let undergrad memories of nasty pisswater beer and drunk privileged men ignoring me enforce my association of bars and pubs as skanky pits and so, just never bother to venture there [damn, i have so many memories of myself walking purposefully down the hill from the library after a late night, and resisting looking right or left at the strip of restaurants and bars in the center of town]... what i'm saying is just ugh god it's just good to indulge in the feeling of sexual freedom that i talk and theorize ad nauseaum in lecture and my own research...not be afraid to embody that pleasure and danger of dressing up being a sexuy black woman, and taking pleasure in the danger of asserting such a striking image rather than fearing that highlighting my sexuality only invites predatory, sexually menacing gazing and other unwanted consequences. so the fuck what if men heckle or oogle me...i won't let their voices barricade me from going inside the loungy entertainment, good company, witty conversation inside. to top the evening off, after enjoying tapas with the queen diva, i went to see bertolucci's "the dreamers" with the boy whom i've decided once and for all never to let know that i'd date him in a heartbeat. he's unseducible from a very committed relationshp, and i realized i'm really not all into seducing him...he just represents a body who gives such warm embracing hugs...the type which i don't want to let go of, and those arms have hugged me hello and goodbye for five years now. would be perfectly satisfied to fall asleep in his arms at night... now, i know, desiring his strong, stable, accepting, consistent open arms to cradle me to sleep isn't the same erotic dream as his arms encircling my back tilting my pelvis forward... sigh yet, i wouldn't give up license to his unhesitant untroubled hello/goodbye hug for the world...and funny enough, when we went out for matte tea afterwards and out of nowhere asked "damn, didn't that movie make you want to just go out and have sex"...and he's like "actually, no." quite honestly,i don't think he recognized any double-edgedness to my question, but i at least blurted out an unfinished question, and enjoyed the relief of having once broached the question, however displaced and askance that i posed the question. and that's okay... remembering the weirdness i wedged into a perfectly close friendship because i said yes to her whimsical desire to have sex for the hell of it, on the condition that she returned to her partner later that night reminds me to keep a lid on fantasies of containable one-night stands... there's no such thing!!!! ... i don't want him to turn his relationship into an "open marriage" and neither would i wish to be his somethin' somethin' to distract him from his partner's recent move out of town... ...nope, too much dra-ma, no more f*cking dra-ma!!!!!!!!!!!!! so ...and so we parted with goodnight in a routine embrace ... because he's already given me all i need to get by in that hug...i came home to my teddy bear beloved, whose stuffed arms aren't long enough to encircle me; nevertheless, his old reliable bedfellowship satisfies enough to carry me dreaming for just one more night..
MUSIC: stan getz, "it might as well be spring"
READING: eve sedgwick," tendencies"
FEELING:anticipation
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