Congratulations, Fridayers! Hey guess what — as of yesterday, one of my children is legally allowed to operate a variety of automotive machinery that will transport him from one place to another, without the supervision of an adult! Isn’t America cool? I hope you all have a bright, weird, hilarious weekend!
You Should Go or Do or Give
+ Support this neat new kids’ book with a gender-fluid look at preschool fun, I’m Jay, Let’s Play!
Queer as in F*ck You
+ Y’ALL. Y’all. Gay Until Labor Day: Stretching Female Sexuality in the Hamptons.
+ To Be a Queer Girl Among Straight Girls, 24/7.
+ How Many Americans Are Gay? Time magazine is all up in your business right now. Super gay over there.
+ My Magical Week at a Massive Bikini-Clad Festival for Queer Women of Color.
+ Tiffany Mugo Uses Technology to Tell the Stories of African Queer Women.
+ LGBT Groups Barred From Attending UN Aids Conference. Sure guys, makes sense.
+ Would you like to float away on a sea of Cameron Esposito? You can do that: Cameron Esposito, Lesbian Comedian and Your Future President. ⛵
+ Julien Baker on Being Queer, Southern, Christian and Proud.
Doll Parts
+ Oh, this. This this this. This is just too fucking much. Report Finds the Military Punished Women Who Reported Sexual Assault by Discharging Them. Burn it down.
+ ADHD, Not MPDG: Growing Up With Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.
+ With Temporary Tattoos, Artist Makes Their Invisible Disabilities Easy to See.
+ Here are some thoughts about midwifery and the home birth scene, if that’s the kind of thing you like to think about. How a Midwife ‘Witch Hunt’ is Hurting Women’s Choices in Childbirth.
+ Chloe Sevigny Details Unwanted Sexual Advances From Directors, More at Cannes.
+ Cutting Through the Patriarchy with One of LA’s Few Female Barbers.
Saw This, Thought of You
+ This Longreads list that I’m pretty sure you’ll love: I Can See Your Future: Six Stories About Psychics.
+ Well it’s Tree Week on Atlas Obscura, so I hope you’ve set aside some time to celebrate. My favorites are Vintage Photos of Tree Worship at Western College for Women and How Do Trees Sleep?.
+ In News You Can Get Behind: Tyrannosaurus Rex Would’ve Had Lips.
And Finally
Look what we’re making this weekend! DIY Hanging Clay Air Plant Holders!
oh man that diy plant holder is super cute! i hope you instagram your final product <3
Well congrats on your first child getting his license. You know have an extra hand to run errands. Side note, Subaru wagons don’t just scream we’re going to Dinah or Indigo Girls show, but they make great first cars that last.
Real talk, I’ve wanted to get him a Subaru this entire time and now that you’ve endorsed them, I feel like it’s a sign from the universe that it’s meant to be. SUBARU HERE WE COME.
I have had a Subaru for 8 years and I can never go back. I have had exactly 0 real problems with it and, as any of my Real Life Friends could attest to you I am notoriously hard on cars. They are wonderful amazing vehicles and the brand works super hard to be environmentally conscious. Two very enthusiastic thumbs up!
If he doesn’t want wagon the Impreza is a great choice, and it handles well(specially WRX model), and great for all seasons. Legacy is another good one, but larger. If you are not going new, my personal suggestion would be the Saab 9-2x. It’s Subaru Impreza Wagon(least queer of the wagons), but with a slightly more luxurious Saab(another queer gal car) interior. It can be had for great price, cause most people didn’t realize this car existed. Plus, you get a slightly more luxurious ride.
Oh man I just got rid of my used 17 yr old Saab 9-5 — that I thought I’d eventually turn over to him — because the repairs were just killing us. I loved that car so much though! ?????
9-5 is all Saab(maybe hints of GM, don’t remember), this one is all Subaru; in fact some call it Saabaru. Only real difference is the Saab corporate face, tires, seats, and a slightly more luxurious tuned ride. Engine options, and awd(standard) are all Subaru.
I know what you mean, I had a car I had to give up, cause it was just time. But, it went to a good queer home luckily.
I got my license this past summer and bought my very first car and it is a Subaru and I love it.
Which one did you get? I have a 2007 Forester and it is still just as rad as the day I got it.
I love talking to people about their Subarus.
@krisdoesstuff I thought about the Forester but it was just a bit bigger than I felt comfortable with, being a newbie driver. I got a Crosstrek and it is perfect for everything. 9″ clearance and AWD so I can bounce around over forest service roads, enough space in the back that I can sleep in it, but it still feels like a small car and is great on gas. (I sound like a Subaru commercial and I’m ok with that.)
@chandra I got to drive the Crosstrek when I took my Forested in for service last month! I loved it so much I think I’m going to make it my next car.
Oh, and maybe it’s cause I’ve been going to unisex barber shops, but I never found it odd as a kid when a woman cut my hair, and in fact kind of prefer it.
Oh wow oh wow. I don’t even know where to start with that “Gay Until Labor Day” article. Can someone reach Cherie Jaffe for comment?
RIGHT??
Thanks for the round-up!
I’m excited for your air plant project, I’m getting ready to be living out of my vehicle for a while and have been trying to figure out how I could incorporate some air plants into my interior…I’ve got a few more days to make it happen. Plants are important!
And yes, seconding the WTF with that labor day article, seriously? I guess I never did my personal training work in the right neighborhoods…
!!!! AIR PLANTS IN THE CAR that is such a cute idea!
If I am successful…I will take pictures!
So many good links! Can’t wait to read the psychics articles. The fifth one looks particularly interesting.
Yes! Emily Perper is so good at putting together lists that are ridiculously relevant to my interests.
Although I had a great therapist help me in my ADHD diagnosis, the article about it was really comforting. I could really relate to the author when she said,” I was a weird, dreamy, shy child who struggled to make friends from kindergarten on and often meandered through my own fantasy worlds.” I can relate to this a lot and I still feel this way and I still have my own fantasy world I dream about.I still haven’t told my family though. My family thinks ADHD is a “white” illness and since I was a “good” student, my mom laughed it off the one time I told her I might have ADHD. Is it strange to feel ashamed for having ADHD? Luckily this community has actually helped me through my journey by providing me with entertaining distractions ?. Plus the positive attitudes from a majority of the AS community really do cheer me up. Thanks everybody ?
I can’t bring myself to read the ADHD article for fear it’ll be written by an ADHD person who managed to Successfully Navigate University and then, like, crush my self esteem all over again
Or one of those articles like “ADHD women often do very well in school and don’t realize how much they’ve been struggling until they get to college!11!”
Cue My Hollow Laughter Into A Void Of Self Loathing
Y’all I’m 24 and depressingly still feel bitter over people who were good students, or even just OK students.
“what do you mean, school isn’t for you; you’re so SMART”
– Thing that well-intentioned people say as a sort of compliment, that really just makes me feel like five different types of Failure
Been there, felt that (and still frequently feel it tbh).
Trying to get through school when you’re pretty smart but also have (in my case totally undiagnosed) ADHD (and in my case also undiagnosed aspergers. and probably also a sleeping disorder that I only found a name for a few days ago. plus depression and anxiety mostly brought on by trying to cope with all of the above without understanding any of it) is a perfect recipe for like 50 different kinds of self esteem problems.
Up until I was about 14 I was managing to cope (though less and less well as time went on). Then it all kind of crashed into itself in a beautiful mess of a trainwreck. I stopped going to school, which lead to me getting diagnosed, then went back for a few classes a week, then switched to small amounts of one on one tuition before eventually just giving up when I was 17. I’m 22 now, and the last time I tried any kind of educational setting I lasted less than a week (a few days in my anxiety levels were so high that it caused my first (and only) dissociation experience. It was very not fun).
So yeah, just the concept of school (and exams in particular) still has the power to send my stress levels through the roof, and I’m getting increasingly practiced at finding creative non-lies that make me sound like I’m not a complete disaster, for when those well meaning but nosy people you barely know start asking if you’re in college/what are you studying?
All this to say, ADHD is a fucking pain in the ass, and I honestly don’t have a clue how anyone with it manages to get their life together and actually keep it that way.
Damn. Now I feel bad for doing well in school. But I also self medicated to and suffered from extreme depression to the point that school was my only source of structure. My good grade was also the only way I could even get attention from adults, so there’s that. I don’t think anyone is a failure because of bad grades or failing at other things that require commitment. But I understand how you feel.
Pls don’t feel bad for struggling in your own way while I struggled in mine
I have this very specific self esteem problem that is really tied up with school and my grades and feeling like I’d never finish a project or be good at anything, and it doesn’t mean that your experience isn’t valid
It does, however, mean that I’m 100% unable to give good or meaningful advice to academically successful people who are stressed about school or “finding a job in their field” etc etc, because I really struggle to sympathize with that plight at the moment
My school issues are like one third ADHD related, two thirds related to the fact that by the time I was diagnosed, I’d developed this really intense complex about my grades and self worth, along with homework related problems that were almost phobic in nature
Like, nightly meltdowns. I cried and screamed and fought over homework literally every school night until probably 8th grade.
So, yeah
Don’t feel bad for being a good student
That is intense. I can’t help but feel bad because I am sensitive that way. Once I witnessed a bad break up on a bus and I ended up crying for the guy, the girl was really harsh saying he wasn’t successful enough for her. So I can’t really help feeling bad because I can relate to a degree and want to make it better. Like bake you a cake that says “Fuck grades, you got cake!”
Since I can’t bake And send you a cake or what ever desert your heat desires, I can offer a virtual friendly hug and positive reinforcement. I try not to view failure as failure, but as delayed success, especially after all my friends got their degrees. And if you ever want to, feel free to pm me if you ever feel down or rant.
Oh my god, equating grades with self worth, check. Borderline phobic issues with homework, check. And that was by the age of 10. By 14 it had developed into a full blown school phobia. Had trouble leaving the house in the morning to go to school, my legs would literally go weak underneath me. And when I got as far as the school I’d end up sitting in the car for like 10 minutes, taking deep breaths and trying to work up the courage to go in. Some days I managed it, others not so much. It was hell.
But yeah, my whole grades = self esteem problem caused such a bad case of perfectionism that I got a no grade on a practice exam because I couldn’t make myself write down an answer I didn’t know for sure was Perfect. That was honestly one of my rock bottom moments. A few months later I took the real test, and got an A. I’d done very little study in between, but I had managed to suppress enough of the perfectionism to actually write stuff down, which helped!
Despite that progress it’s still an issue I struggle with today, despite years of really working hard to unlearn it and trying to be kinder/more accepting of myself. That shit really fucks you up :/
The queer girl among straight girls article is my life, except I’m single. I’m not actively isolating myself, but my whole queer circle of friends moved away and it’s entirely too exhausting to be the odd one out when I go out with friends and everyone brings their husbands/fiances/boyfriends/persons of the male gender with whom they associate. I get grief from my friends when I don’t want to spend another night with them talking about married life while they occasionally throw me a patronizing “have you met a nice…girl?…yet? You still like girls, right?” ughhh
Not to lower the tone, but I was purromissed pussy whispurrers and I can’t find them :'(
On a less libidinous note, the midwifurry article really speaks to me because my Mum had a terrible expurrience giving purrth to my sister and decided to have me at home so she could actmewally have some agency. I could ramble about this but my Mum is really couragepuss (not that going to hospital isn’t).
It’s okay, I loCATed the pussy whispurrers – apawlogies!
Thanks for sharing the children’s book I’m working on, Laneia! And thanks for the great round up, as always!