humanity
Humanity begins at home.
Part 3/3: Lost my virginity at 6 years old & Danny DeVito is a douche.
Rape seemed like an insane concept. I was intrigued with the power dynamic she spoke of when describing it all to me. It had never occurred to me that a man was more powerful than a woman, or could be. If you were to ask me, the fact that the power dynamic was my first thought about it all meant that Mama was doing something very right. I'm proud to look back and remember thinking more about the fact that men felt they could do this, then about the fact that men do, do this. She told me to warn me. So that when I was approached by odd men or creepy pedophiles, I'd know the risk and stay far away. Do not take candy from strangers. She didn't just want to save my teeth from sugar; she wanted to make sure I didn't have my “candy” stolen either.
By JaimeTheJew6 years ago in Families
Part 2/3: Lost my virginity at 6 years old & Danny DeVito is a douche.
Since my main goal in my short 6 years of life was to laugh and make others laugh as well, I was simply fascinated with sex. It was everywhere and it was hilarious. Everyone on TV was making sexual innuendoes and listening to adults (when they don't think your listening) gave me the giggles. I needed to know more about sex, why it was so funny, and how to get in on the jokes and understand why I was laughing instead of just seeing others start to laugh and join in along with them. I decided then, it was time for me to lose my virginity. Who needs it, right?
By JaimeTheJew6 years ago in Families
Just A Woman
A POT OF GRITS AND A POT OF RICE Daddy was popular in Savannah because of his radio shows on WSOK and WEAS, but we were not too snobby for the basics. We had a nice house in a nice neighborhood, cooked our own food, and did our own chores. We were not the ones to buy sprawling mansions and have live-in maids once a dollar found its way into the house. My parents came from modest means, so my mother went back to work part-time when my little sister started school. She joked that she didn’t want to be another bored, upper-middle class housewife who became a ‘card-playing alcoholic’.
By Deanna Lang6 years ago in Families
I’ll Always Hate Zucchini
I’ll Always Hate Zucchini “Drop the zucchini and run,” said my mother, before we lost her on that first night of our holidays in Mexico, “it’s the only thing I can do.” I was ten at the time and had poked my head around the corner, thinking everyone else was asleep as the cursed vegetable rolled on the ground.
By Frank Talaber6 years ago in Families
A Story of Chairs
Think of the chairs in your life. Did your mom or dad have a favorite chair? Did your Grandparents? I think of my first chair, a diminutive red velvet rocking chair that I named “Redda.” My dad picked it up from a roadside stand during one of his trucking trips and gave it to me shortly after my birth. It went through me as well as four younger siblings and by the end of our childhood most of the dark red velvet was rubbed of the seat and arms. The back came loose twice while my dad was alive. The last time he fixed it, he told me that if it happened again, it was going to the dump. It was a thought that nearly broke my heart. I loved that little chair and had spent many hours in it, playing with toys at the old olive green coffee table, reading Dick and Jane books or listening to records on the old record player. I was very careful with it after that warning and frequently cautioned my younger siblings to treat with care as well.
By Amber M Martell6 years ago in Families
Fracture
You’ve been here before, your friend holding an innocent captive behind the rusted barrel of a silver Glock. It’s his father’s. Faint rings of white powder crust around his nostrils like crystalized sugar, and his shoulders sag. It takes all his energy to lift his right arm, the pistol grabbing gravity like a bell weight. But he stands firm, the clerk mesmerized by those glazed eyes.
By Christian Wright6 years ago in Families
Disbanding the Normative Nuclear Family
The concept of “The Family” unanimously pervades cultures and communities, albeit without remaining universal in its meaning, despite stereotyped understandings of what a ‘family’ is. This essay will consider whether the concept of the family is exactified or dissembled through anthropological study in exploring differing understandings and examples of “The Family”, and how these representations help us understand if a concrete notion of family can be established and, if, so, how that notion may be defined. In order to conduct this consideration, the more stereotypical understanding of the nuclear family will be observed through considering a Malinowskian viewpoint, which will then be questioned in relation to more ethnographically-sourced observations of “The Family”. The overarching message of this essay will be to evoke the sentiment that “families- like religions, economies, governments, or courts of law- are not unchanging but the product of various social forms, that the relationship of spouses and parents to their young are apt to be different things in different social orders.” (Collier et al, 76) From this understanding, this essay will hopefully succeed in articulating how the anthropological study of “The Family” gives meaning to the term, and how that meaning effectively develops a conceptualization of familial structures.
By Channing Cook6 years ago in Families
The little things
The media seems to be filled to bursting with images, essays and opinions on the Black Lives Matter issue, and quite rightly so. I was considering this competition prompt and something came to mind that for me demonstrates how sub-consciously ingrained racism actually can be.
By Julie Murrow6 years ago in Families
Protests
So, with being a single parent, how are able to work? Maybe we had to be let go due to business being shut down, maybe we got fired due to schools and childcare being shut down. Whatever the case may be we are struggling in trying to figure out how to care for our children with making sure they have food and a roof over their head as well as making sure we can pay for electricity.
By Jessica Hawk6 years ago in Families
A Samoan Heart Buried in America
I am a far cry from home, this is as clear as the brown skin I wear. When my mother decided to remarry, a white man at that from America, I was baffled. Her and I both knew little to no English, and if it wasn't for the mere luck that she was working at Evalani's (a bar and grill resort on the lovely Island of American Samoa) where travelers frequented, she would have never met my step dad, a nightmare to be, and gotten tangled up in some romantic Island love story that ended in divorce years later right in the center of America. Land of the free, home of the brave.
By Centenary Alfrey6 years ago in Families
