Op-ed to the Ogre at the grocery store

To the man that thought a parking space was worth the aftermath;

Yesterday was a different day for me, for the first time in months I could move my arm...after surgery and the endless trips to drain the wound, finally after doing my own physio because of course I cannot afford to get it professionally I was finally able to lift my arm over my shoulder...should have been a great day. I was able to drive myself, my mom and my son to town for the first time with no pain or fear of having to move quickly with the pain in my arm I was all ready to face the town and off we went.

Things were great, we were doing well, stopped at the mail, got my mum a new fridge since hers has been pissing all over the floor for a bit, even had a few laughs with the woman at the appliance store and off to the pharmacy I went.....some hard moments there while I looked for something to strengthen my hair, sadly Lyme is taking my once full hair and making it fall out in bucketloads. I have been watching it fall for months and finally my husband could not pretend anymore and admitted yes its getting very thin.....so I went in looking for Biotin...yes I found it but still this was enough to make me feel very low and as I pulled into my local grocery store I told my mom to go in and I would follow when I was feeling a little better.....I sat in the van and cried, my son in the back seat was thankfully engrossed in his tablet so he hadn't noticed....I sat in the handicap parking space and wiped my eyes, listened to Nazareth and prepared myself to go in the store....big breath almost ready....key on the ignition to turn it off, then you pulled your big ass truck into my parking spot....not into another handicap parking spot but actually onto the yellow bars that are part of my parking spot....I remember sighing and debating whether I should say anything or not, I was still feeling very vulnerable and exposed with red eyes, but when you opened your door and almost hit my van I opened my window and nicely told you that is not a parking spot, it is actually a part of my spot....you responded with I am handicapped, and I told you I am as well but that is still not a parking spot, there are 3 more available choose one....well you slammed your door shut, your wife got out and went in as you stormed around the other cars and quite easily backed your truck up into another handicap spot. For me I thought this was over as I watched you walk into the store. You were in there less than 2 mins as I was telling my son to get ready to put his tablet away because we were going in to get cream and some things....just as I put my hand on that ignition you came barreling out of the store....headed straight for me....I have seen that look before...

What you didn't know was that I am a domestic abuse survivor, I am also a rape survivor and I walk very gently in this life because I deal with anxiety, panic and C-PTSD from my past experiences with angry men. I told my son to head to the back of the van, as you approached and raised your hand to punch my window...I opened it, you started attacking me, with your hand on my window while flipping me finger, telling me I did not need this spot and how dare I be selfish and sit in it....did you have a right to do this? no but you did anyway....I had my phone in my hand and had tried to take your picture and start it recording but did not get it started in time to catch you and all your vile behavior, no you were lucky in that moment that my panic and fight or flight response made my fingers not work and I was unable to catch you asking my SON if he was learning from his mother.....yes I lost it at that moment, finally had the phone working and I lost it when you spoke to my son with Aspergers.....how dare you? did you know you were causing so much emotional issues? did you know you were being a bully? yes you did! but did you care? no you did not! over a parking space that you tried to take that was not even yours! I was already parked in it but you somehow felt your white man privilege meant you were somehow more entitled to take whatever you wanted...I guess that poinsettia that you and your wife needed to buy was so important that you totally trampled on the rights of a woman and child that were already in the spot you want.

I watched you walk away as my mother came out of the store, I prayed you would leave her alone and not start with her as well, but you raised your voice across the parking lot and acted so proud of yourself, because of course I appeared to be the shrill one, the one that was screaming at you at that point to leave me alone and be on your way....yes I called you an asshole, yes I told you you had no right to judge who uses a handicap parking space....do you realize how hard it was for me to go to my doctor that I have known for 25yrs and even discuss this permit? do you know he almost cried and felt bad to tell me he was marking down that it was a permanent disability....did you even know that not long ago I could barely walk without help? or that standing for more than a half hour could make me fall to the floor? no you did not! did you care? no you did not! All you cared about was that you felt you were somehow justified to walk up to someone else's vehicle and threaten to hit it, and try to intimidate a woman and child and I watched you, you walked away feeling good about this with your wife. 

You did not think about any of that or even the fact that the whole scenario started due to you invading a parking spot that already had a vehicle in it. It was not even like there weren't other spots available, there were 3! two of which were even closer to the door than the one you tried to take and violated my own personal space.....but yes your privilege meant in your head everything you did you did out of some right that you did not have, other than you are a man and I am a woman and it was ok to try to intimidate me. Let's be clear you could have let it go at the I'm sorry thats not a parking spot but you chose not to, you made the conscious choice to do what you did and you walked away laughing thinking that you somehow had stood up to a horrible person that was taking a spot they did not deserve but you were wrong....what you actually did was act like an Ogre and take pride in your own bad behaviour.....the Gods are large and they see everything and as I write this I know your comeuppance will come, and it will be grand when it does....its a small town I know I will hear about it, and will probably light a candle of thanks when it happens but until then I will deal with the aftermath of your ignorance, selfishness and privilege by loving my son a little more, holding him tight and reminding him that not all men are Ogres, some are kind and helpful and that no he does not need to be afraid to go to his favourite store in town....no he can still go there and say hi to the owner, and be all proud when he says hi to him by name.....the only good I found out of the whole situation was me having to admit to my child that I should have used my words better and not let the mean man make me so angry that I lost control of those words....you see what I did there? yes I took your bad behaviour and made it into a teaching moment because that is what I do, I put myself aside and helped him understand....and then I explained it to my mother who at 75 was quite scared of your actions as well....I dropped them off at home and parked my van in the shelter and cried.......and cried until I could go in my home and not let my son see me falling apart because of you.....it did not help because the Aspergers freak out came, and I held my son while he cried because he felt he could not defend his mother from you.....the mean man at the grocery store, that is what you will forever be in his eyes, so when he runs into you in this town again and freaks out, remember you caused this...

Now go on and enjoy that plant and give it to whoever you thought you would stop and get it for, tell them the story about how you told a woman off in the parking lot and how you felt like such a big man after that....it is probably the only time you feel like a big man is when you are trying to intimidate women and children....the Gods are big and they see everything.

I never did get my cream.....

Does my vagina threaten you?

What do you do when you want to write but you just can't find the words? well for me I sit and stare at the screen, I write a sentence, backspace it off and then stare some more....there is so much I want to say, so much has happened in almost a year since I have sat and written, I mean I still write, but short posts, little notes and I of course journal, but when it came to writing here well I just couldn't do it......then today after the events of this week I decided enough of the silence.......my question is simple, maybe shocking, but simple nonetheless....does my vagina threaten you? or is it simply that I do not have a penis but rather a vagina that threatens you?

I am many things, witch, daughter, wife, mother, mom (which you might think is mother but mom is distinctly different than mother), and avó (grandmother in Portuguese), yes I am all these labels and then I am me....but I am so much more than the labels, I am so much more than what I am to all those that look to me, but that gets lost, in the day to day, in the taking care of others and doing what needs doing......me I get lost.......as I know so many of us do...for me the last year and a bit have been a long haul, some of the longest times of my life with the treatment of Late Stage Lyme, I will treat for the rest of my life....I know this....I am ok with this....the alternative is let it run rampant and my life becomes significantly shorter....that I am not ok with.

All of us have our struggles, agreed? I thought that the worst thing I would have to deal with was the Lyme treatment then in early March my mother fell down the back steps, it was a hugely traumatic and painful thing for her, and me and my little guy who saw her in that state, she looked like the Elephant Man, face swollen, black eyes starting and totally disoriented, it was terrifying...it's no secret to anyone that knows me or her that we have had a difficult relationship at times through the years, sometimes due to her stuff sometimes mine, but regardless she's my mom and it was terrifying to see her that way, and it brought back flashbacks of when my dad passed first in my arms and then in the ambulance, while was I sitting in there with him.....my mother in law passing of cancer in April as well did not help the feelings of loss, more parents dying, more hard moments......not good times! The fall meant a rush to the hospital, a worried experience to have them not do any kind of tests, just talk to her decide she is fine and send her home.....she is 75 this year....her dizzy spells continued after this....almost 3 months later, after tests, another hospital visit when she thought she was having a stoke, it STILL took me getting upset that no one would listen to her, asking direct questions about accountability in the event that something happens to her before they address the issue, that she in her own right has now isolated to be a medication issue, only to have it ignored and questions about her needing her home assessed for safety since she is so dizzy....drop her dose on her meds and that will stop it....ignored again......thankfully after the abysmal appointment with her practitioner, her cardiologist understood and issued a new script, a lower dose, the next day no more head spins....she is a new woman, she is happy and smiling and enjoying the outdoors, she is no longer confused, upset and confined to one area because she is afraid to fall down the stairs....no joke there, we literally walked with her down the steps and up to make sure that she was ok.....of course this was not a well received experience by her Nurse Practitioner.....they feel I was "threatening and inappropriate" .....well fuck me! I find it highly threatening and inappropriate to risk my mother's life....I racked my brain wondering did I swear? um no....I know I must have yelled? um nope didn't do that either......did I cut her off mid sentence? um yes when she ignored what my mother was trying to tell her.....I was clear, direct and concise, we were not a tea party, this has been going on for near 3 months! the time for idle chat and theories was pretty much gone.....

I am not going to lie, this really upset me, that in advocating for my mother's health, translating for her because although she can speak the language it can get complicated with health questions so it helps at times, in doing that and asking who is to be held accountable since no one will listen is threatening then yep I am totally guilty......do I regret it?  well, let's see in true Libra fashion.......on one hand another person thinks I am an ogre, the evil witch that lives in this little town and curses people....and on the other, my mom is feeling so much better and is enjoying her quality of life......no I don't regret it, I regret that it had to come to that before the situation was handled, I regret that it took so long to sort out, and I ultimately regret that we live in a town with such limited options for health care and I really regret that Lyme disease and diabetes makes it so I can't really drive long distances anymore or I would take her to a doctor in the city....but I do not regret caring enough, and knowing enough that it needed to be handled not put off for another week or two...I am more disappointed in a health care center that although I stopped being their patient years ago knew me, my health issues, my family and yet they completely failed us, there was judgement and disregard really....there was no understanding of the trauma of one parental death, the grief we were currently dealing with, or the experience of a child with Aspergers seeing his grandmother in this state, or even the thought that this was making my mother feel like a prisoner in her mind and in her home, there was no thought other than the fact that they were offended, was it because we were right? because we spoke another language? or was it some other ego soaked, patriarchal bullshit? I am sure I will never truly know what it was.......but it will still sadden me, it disappoints me in women who can't deal with strong women, instead of elevating; they denigrate. We have come so far but yet the dinosaurs walk amongst us.....no offence to dinosaurs! 

I wish we could see a shift in things, especially in the way women see women....when you see a woman advocating for someone or asserting her rights stand with her...don't try to pick her apart, don't join the chorus that tells her when she does this; she is somehow being loud, inappropriate, threatening, shrill, out of control, hysterical and on and on and on.....when a man does this he is seen as strong, exciting, brave, righteous, a hero really....but it is not the same for women, this is not acceptable, and it is even more unacceptable in my eyes when it comes from other women....call me crazy but I kinda think standing together is the only way we improve the life of women AND men around the globe.....one corner of the world at a time, because truthfully patriarchy helps no one....can you imagine the difference we could all make? till that happens being "threatening and inappropriate" is what those of us that do stand up will be considered, because of course the fact that we have vaginas, are articulate and strong, will threaten and offend....sad isn't it? 

well in true Libra fashion, my last thought is at least it busted the crap out of whatever was stuck in my craw and I wrote again!