Category Archives: Communication

Should I Stay or Should I Go Now?

I had an end-of-the-night chat on Twitter with my friend Tris Hussey (@TrisHussey), one of Vancouver’s best WP blogging smartie-pants, about the strange life of being a vanilla girl in a sex-blogger-world.
It’s had me thinking since, which is why I like smartie-pants like Tris.
See, he thinks the world needs more sex-positive voices — especially from everyday-peoples like me, I guess.
Me, I still have a hard time swallowing the role. So to speak.
That’s what my whole journey in sex-blogging was about. Discovering my own sexuality in a more positive way, where I no longer judged my tastes or worried what things might suggest about me ethically or morally.
It was a hard fucking battle and I’m not even sure where I am on that road right now because I’ve been abstaining for too long. Just… because. I didn’t want to think about sexuality. I had to think about me.
But I’ve thought about me. I’m a better “me” than I’ve ever been. Now I’m ready to be more. Again.
I think the reason my sex-writing has been so successful at being applicable to the average person is because I am one. I’m not interested in burlesque. I couldn’t give a shit if I ever experience a threesome. I don’t have anything too crazy going on in my closet, can’t tell you about any really freaky encounters or swinging parties. I don’t have really odd kinks, I don’t need to push any boundaries. I don’t need more/crazier/harder to get off than I used to.
I like a little bondage, a little kink, trying creative positions, and have a little thing about sex in interesting places if time/lack-of-visibility allow. That’s about it.
I’m not off-the-charts with my sexuality, and I’m not even promiscuous. I’m old-fashioned.
But I think into every sex life a little doggy-style must fall. Or maybe a lot. It’s open for debate — let’s bang-out a plan of attack. What can I tell ya?
I think sexuality is probably one of the biggest journeys we all take.
How many people ever truly get comfortable in that context? How many people not only get comfortable with being truly sexual, but do so in a healthy way — they don’t overconsume porn, hurt others in their quest for fulfilling needs, or develop unhealthy dependencies on any particular activity, person, or lifestyling?
The world doesn’t have enough oft-laid happy “average” people skipping through life with a “I”ve been shagged SILLY” bounce to their step. How many accountants do you see walking bow-legged on Monday morning, huh?
The attitudes we DO have about sex, unfortunately, are being shaped by really fucked-up messages on the media, in Hollywood, and the internet. Sleeping around’s more popular than it’s been since the ’70s,  STDs are on the rise, people are experimenting left, right and centre because media’s showing all these alternative approaches to us…
But where’s the heart?
Where’s the emotion?
Why’s there such a profound disconnect between what we’ll let ourselves feel in the crotch versus what we’ll allow our hearts to feel?
What the hell are we thinking?
Sigh. Don’t ask me, man. I’m only beginning to even attempt to crack that nut.
For the last 2-3 years, I’ve not been considering sexuality and society as much as I once did. Re-reading my work has reminded me of why I’d been so angry about it all in the past, and has rekindled my interest in being one of the voices to bring some reason to the argument.
I think so much of what’s wrong with us as a society can be explained through our skewed perspectives on sex.
I’m not suggesting getting laid equals world peace.
I’m suggesting that it’s the attitudes we associate with sex that matter, not necessarily about whether we’re getting laid or not.
When we do get shagged, how vulnerable do we truly let ourselves be? How willing are we to let our loved ones into our deeper darker places we’re scared to admit exist? How ready are we to open the doors to where we keep our skeletons?
Sex is the physical realm of mental trust. What you’re willing to do mentally SHOULD translate sexually, vice versa.
Yet how often is that true?
Are you open to others, do you accept all ways of life, can you trust those around you, are you comfortable expressing your needs? Tell me what kind of lover you are, and I’ll tell you the answer to those questions. Again, vice versa.
If everyone was open, trusting of others, accepting of other lifestyles and worldviews, willing to be versatile, able to be vulnerable but also strong when needed, and could let others lead when necessary but follow when called for, what kind of world do you think we’d live in?
Don’t tell me sex can’t heal us.
Don’t tell me sex isn’t an important statement on who and what we are as a people.
And don’t even think of telling me we’re okay.
I’m not crazy about standing up here and being the sex-positive poster-girl. I’m not enthused about the judgment or speculation it promises to hold for me. I’m not happy this job needs doing by anyone.
But there’s no one out there talking about sex for ME.
There’s no one *I* get. No one echoes the battles I’ve fought, the lessons I’ve learned, and the thoughts I’ve had in a way that really resonates.
And I know how alone I felt and how fucked up and self-judgey I was, and for how long.
Someone needs to speak for me.
So I will.
And hopefully it’ll mean a few other people feel spoken for.
Because I’m getting real fuckin’ tired of the people who’ve been doing all the talking so far.

RANT: Labels Kill Sexuality

Four years ago I wrote a posting about cheating and in it I had a little rant about being called an “older woman” by the letter-writer when I was only 32. The posting is here, and today I deleted a comment that referred to the rant-within-the-posting with this comment that I’ve chosen to delete for its stupidity:
“The sound of a cougars claws slipping down the slope called age.”
That was the comment in its entirety, aside from quoting the entire paragraph under the blockquote-box’s question.
It pissed me off. Why?
I’m the anti-cougar. Continue reading

Why Do I Blog? Some Thoughts.

After editing this, it occurs to me it should be two separate posts, both developed more fully, but that’s a lot of work. I’ll try to expand a bit on the “social” aspect, or even the socio-political aspects I allude to, in another posting, and I’ll post this here & now as-is. That way, you get something to snack on, I have less guilt about underproducing, and we both have a happy Friday. 😉
I’m thinking a lot about blogging today, because I’ve been asked to talk to a couple small groups of keeners tomorrow and talk about why I blog, what my process is. I’ve got some thoughts on that, but, I guess I’m ultimately a little unsure what “blogging” has to do with it.
Me, it’s just writing for an audience I have access to. It’s just writing.
We’re lucky these days. We live in an era where having a thought, having a voice, it means something. The world is literally at our fingers.
A thought doesn’t have to die alone in the dark ever again. Continue reading

Social Media Pecking Order? Must We?

I believe I’ve put my foot in it, so I thought I might as well squish it around and make a real good mess. What the hell, right?
I’ve sort of smack-talked Vancouvers “social media” scene when I read the always-awesome Raul/Hummingbird604‘s blog post on same [Where is the Diversity…?] earlier today. First off, I should say I think that getting out to “tweet-ups” through Twitter, as a social tool, is one of the best choices I’ve made in years. I am making great new friends. I love what it’s doing for me.
But there’s a definitive class-system out there, and its obviousness at tweet-ups is GLARING. So I’m tackling my two cents from a different, more pointed perspective here. Continue reading

Why I (Love to) Hate Facebook

There I am, second-last day of vacation, scouring my deck and cleaning my deck chairs. I bought the chairs about eight years ago now. As I scoured them down, a flood of old memories came back — drinks drunk as planes soared in across the southern horizon, headed for the airport’s runways, conversations nattered until wee morning hours with faces that still bring a smile to mine, silent moments spent alone or with others, like one sunny perfect beautiful morning spent with a coffee and a flawless and strangely-quiet empty horizon before finding out a couple planes had earlier crashed into a building and changed America’s future.
It’s just a chair. A measley little chair I see out my window every day, and yet when I really crunch the memories as I scour it down from up-close, a world I’ve lived through in eight years come washing over me. It’s just a chair. Wow.

Imagine if everything had that kind of conjuring power? But then I log into Facebook. Continue reading

The Trouble With Writing

I have this longstanding love/hate relationship with writing.
I love the articulation of thought, the solving of ideas, the expressing of inner qualities.
The trouble with readers is, what they see is what they get.
You people, you read my blog and you somehow think what I put up here is some finite guide to the divinity of Steff, or some such.
Unfortunately, it’s not. Continue reading

Saying What's Meant and Meaning What's Said

We, as a society, seem pretty lost on the subject of communicating these days.
Oh, sure, we’ve got the surfacing of it all down pat. We text each other. Email abounds. Blogging has given a voice to everyone we wish never had one. Twitter makes it possible to nanobroadcast your life. Coworkers instant message each other from their desks. Feet? Who needs ’em? We’re more in touch with each other without even moving than we’ve ever been.
Yet it’s like the end of communication’s been happening before our very eyes. Does anyone ever really SAY anything anymore? Does any of it ever really MEAN anything? Continue reading

The Most Annoying Conversation

I had a chance to go to a huge party Saturday night, but I decided I wasn’t very much on my social game, and that a simple one-on-one conversation would be better suited for the day I should have after a long week, so I made plans for a drink with someone instead.
Well, so much for being on my social game.
It was my first time meeting this guy. I figured, smart conversation and some drinks, a nice mellow time, right?
And maybe that’s how it would’ve felt if I could have gotten a word in edgewise. But I didn’t. So, no, not so nice, not so mellow.
While I’m often excessively articulate and pretty quick-thinking about it, I go through phases where I’m thinking more than speaking, and when I do talk, I’m a bit more measured and slow about it. I often like to do crazy things, like think before I speak, so I’ve been known to take something like 5-10 seconds to formulate my comment.
But apparently hesitation kills and no one should be allowed such time before speaking, if my night was any measure of that. My drinks-date interrupted me every single time I spoke. Not once could I naturally finish my thought. Every. Single. Time. I even got pissed off now and then at him interrupting, and CONTINUED speaking, despite him not stopping his interruption. Still, didn’t take the hint. I even said, “You talk too much” and made a couple comments that way, and, nope, didn’t slow him down a stitch.
And then the other thing was, any thing I did manage to say, he either turned it into a statement about him and his life, or else he just flat-out said he didn’t like my opinion. (I said, “I want to go to New York soon” and he goes, “I hate New York, it’s all concrete.” Well, I’m not fucking visiting there for a park, now, am I, when I live in a rainforest surrounded by ocean, mountains, and amazing land? Like New York’s competing with THAT? I’m going for a concrete jungle and “the city that never sleeps”. Fuck. Stop making me justifty myself.)
I gradually just stopped giving a shit and phoned the conversation in. Why fucking bother? Like anything I said mattered anyhow? Every time I spoke, I was interrupted, or informed that my opinion wasn’t at all correct. Way to make a companion feel like they matter and have something to contribute, huh?
I wanted to bitch-slap myself yesterday when I realized I was doing the story-trumping thing myself. You know, say someone goes, “I just climbed a mountain!” and you go, “Wow. Which one? Oh, I’ve climbed that seven times. It’s pretty shitty. Next time you should–” and it’s all right when we do that once or twice, it happens, right? But I think I did it a few times yesterday and I thought, “Wow, you arrogant cunt. Shut up.” So I shut up and listened then on.
This guy needs that inner voice to do a little shouting, methinks.
The irony of all this is, I recognize I’ve become too internal and too into myself of late, so I’ve been working to try and make myself a better listener and a more measured and gracious speaker. I was never, ever as bad as this fellow is, but it certainly serves as a reminder of why I’m trying to take myself to a new level as far as the give-and-take of conversation goes.
If people tell you that you talk too much, you probably do. Maybe you should listen.
If you like interrupting people because you think what you have to say is so brilliant, maybe you need to understand that it’s rude and it’s offensive, and it’s essentially saying to people, “I don’t give a shit what you have to say, because I’m wittier and better than you.”
Next time I want to feel not smart enough or not appreciated, I know who to call.
But, you know, I’m gravitating toward people who know how to make others feel appreciated and liked. It feels good. Who knew?

Overreacting, or Right On The Money? TWITTER SPAT!

A Twitterer I was following, who has hundreds of followers, made a couple comments in the last couple days in which he’s using homosexual terms to insult others, like “gay” and “faggot”.
Strikes me as a very grade-five thing to say, and I call him on it. Publically. He called me politically correct and blocked me.
Here’s my Twitter feed’s archive. Now here’s the exchange.
Greg Scott’s initial comments:

Professional soccer players are such faggots.

When I call pro soccer players faggots I am referring to their repeated dramatic displays of injury, the most disgraceful in all of sport.

And, the next day:

Pink tie against a pink dress shirt with a grey blazer. Good gravy. The CBC National weather guy has every right to dress gay but why?

So, I said:

First some athletes are “faggots” now this guy dresses “gay”? Wanna get a 21st century vocab and ditch the homophobia?

To which he wittily retorted:

Your fear of language and over reaction to words evokes a stifling political correctness I’d prefer you not share with me.

And I got blocked. Dang, Hilda, when am I gonna learn to play nicely with others?
Mm. Yes. I’m just SO politically correct. That’s all this blog smacks of, all day long. Political correctedness. Its predecessor was called The Cunting Linguist but when I got interviewed on San Francisco radio and they couldn’t say the blog name, I thought, “Well, that’s no good.” So here we are at Smut and Steff. Politically correct? My fucking ass.
Wanker. In the world’s largest language, with more than a million words, you have to use “faggot” and “gay” as your adjectives? Your definition of “faggot” as it pertains to the soccer players, for instance, sounds more like a word I know as “actors” or some would even say “hams”, and I’m not opposed to insulting pigs.
Also, I think the fashion-challenged meteorologist sounds more “effeminate” or even “sissy” than gay, since most of the gay men I know can kick most straight mens’ asses. As Jon Stewart says, “Gay goes to the gym.
But, really, as long as we’re living in a world where people are still carrying placards that reads “God hates fags” and are dressing their kids in shirts like these? Yeah, I’m going to make a comment when fuckwits banter about words that sound a little laced with hate and judgment and 1960s mentality, thinking they’re all witty and cute. Somebody should. And I fucking VOLUNTEER.
When you’re using it as an insult, pal, you’re saying it’s a bad thing, you’re judging. And itmakes you an ass, even if it’s just you in your smug urban-hipster posturing.

But hey. I’m just a politically correct cunt with an itchy Twitter-finger. So what do I know?

On Freedom and Fallacies

This is take two on this topic. I’m starting fresh a couple hours later, after a glass of wine and homemade chicken pot pie.
It’s the second take because this topic is really important to me and I don’t want to fuck it up.
Thank god I have quality guidance like that of Fame. Yes, you heard me, the ‘80s arts school drama. It’s on, and I’m chilling. Defragging my mind, as I like to say. Watching fluff is exactly the right fit, and has given me some interesting perspective as I crack this nut for a second time.
Funnily, a girl in this episode of Fame scoffs at the notion of writing her private thoughts and dreams in a diary at the teacher’s urging.
“If I wrote down my dreams,” she says, “I’d get arrested.”
Yeah. Huh. Ironic.
To that end, take note of the week that was in the world of the wide web. Proper fucked, indeed. It’s like a crash course in What Not to Do in the Intertubez.
A Montreal guy writes some shit in a forum then figures rifle + college = a good afternoon’s plan.
Like the motherfucking coward he was, he went out and tried to kill a bunch of people. Realizing he couldn’t even do a massacre right, he deprived us of the fun of letting cops kill him. The coward took his life. Fucking better off dead, anyhow.
But he wrote in forums.
We shoulda seen it coming.
A dickhead in Seattle decides he’s going to act like a fucking 13-year-old and reposts another city’s craigslist ad by some dirty-minded femme, and gets a couple hundred responses or something, then figgers he’s got rights to publish that private correspondence in an attempt to expose those apparent sickos to the world.
But they answered a public ad.
They shoulda seen it coming.
A young mother in Florida writes her secret other self dark thoughts on a public blog, and then her child goes mysteriously missing, improbably snatched from their window. Young mother kills herself 16 days into the toddler’s absence.
But she wrote dark shit on blogs, then her kid vanishes.
We shoulda seen it coming.
A video diarist on the world wide web is exposed as a professional actress working off a script. The show is produced, directed, and written, yet has duped the majority of its viewers, primarily through YouTube.com, into believing the so-called lonelygirl15 was a teenaged girl locked in her bedroom and homeschooled by orthodox religious parents. Doh.
She’s a fake.
Like ohmigod. But she, like, really talked to us, man!”
You shoulda seen it coming.
It’s happening. It’s really fucking happening.
You know what I’m talking about.
For some godforsaken reason, it’s starting to occur to people that this, like, internet thing might just be a way of seeing what’s really going on in the noggins of little people everywhere.
And, um, uh-oh, but what’s going on in those little people’s noggins everywhere is something that’s not very pretty.
Some people, it would seem, are angry.
Some of them even feel disenfranchised. And, look. They’re acting on this shit.
Yeah, well. When the odds are stacked, you ought not be surprised at the outcome. Probability and logic being what they are and all, yes?
I’m part of the generation that got schooled in Orwell’s classic 1984. We were raised to believe that someday, one day, the government would hear every word we would utter, and freedom would be a thing of the past.
I’ll be honest, the Digital Age scares me.
The ease with which people can access information about me is frightening. It should frighten you, too. Unfortunately, the time is coming nigh where voices on the web are not just an anonymous blur with little impact on the real world. Now, we’re not so anonymous, and now this world is more real than it is virtual.
There’s coming a time where what you say here is going to come home to haunt you. This is the age of insinuation, and anything you say can be manipulated and used against you. Decide now if you plan to live in fear of that, or if you have the balls to play the game my way, and own your ability to say what you think and how you feel.
In forums such as this, someone such as me might decide to write a little bloggie in which the entire contents of our deepest darkest other selves are posted up on virtual walls for the world at large to indulge in.
In essence, it’s a voice. I have a voice, you have a voice, we all have voices.
It’s idyllic. A virtual Utopia in which we’re all given voices and identities, something that ironically clashes with our seemingly democratic lives – lives spent living in societies that claim to be governed by the people, of the people, for the people.
Only they’re not like any people I’ve ever known.
And I don’t feel like I belong.
And I’m tired of feeling this small because I’m just an ordinary gal.
I thought I’d take my voice and use it. I’m not alone. You’re doing it too. And him, and her, and hey.
We all took our existences online, where we thought we’d have the right to say what we think whenever the fuck it pops into mind.
Unfortunately, when such vocal freedom is enjoyed by a world at large, some of those voices will be beyond dissent. They will be voices of rage and fury and vengeance. Or maybe they’ll be coolly quiet.
And that’s a risk we take by allowing open dialogue.
Every now and then, though, those voices will be warning signals. Intervention might occur, and it might segue to prevention.
Just because assholes and the disenfranchised like these can use the web to serve their fucted means doesn’t necessitate that the rest of us should have to watch our words.
Sadly, the voice of reason doesn’t seem to resonate these days. I fear that the talking heads of today might soon decide that there is such thing as too much free speech and they will indeed succeed in legislating the internet.
In which case now might be the time to, like the good hunter Elmer Fudd suggests, be vewwy, vewwy qwiet.
Only we’re not hunting rabbits.