Not all Entitled, Racist Pigs are Policemen

An old pic of me, around 22 yrs. old. Ran me through a Photoshop filter, years ago.  Looking entirely too much like my daddy.  Photo taken @ Berry’s Drug Store in New Richmond, Clermont, Ohio.

I think I figured out why I have been avoiding the news like the plague. Yesterday it hit me. I was good until the camera’s zoomed in on the lines of police, and all of them holding those black night sticks. Today the flash backs have started… yesterday it was tears. I read recently to just accept the emotion and let it “wash over” me. See it for what it is something temporary. So, that is what I am trying to do. Same said article said it’s actually a good sign. It’s kind of like the beginning of the end-healing that is. It is most definitely something I do not recall sharing with anyone. I have a few of those. Where the violence of it is so bad (in my mind) that why would anyone want to hear it. No, I’ve never been beaten by a cop. I’m a woman who has an ex husband who liked to force many types of items. If you can imagine the worst, minus the horrid beating you can imagine… then you have probably imagined it close to correctly. He was a security guard for a time. Took a special class in using the weapon–something obviously I still see as a tool of torment. Believe me, I do see it that way to this day. Its not like I ended up black and blue—well, not in all the obvious places anyhow. It is what it did to my heart, my soul, and willingness to confront nearly anything. I’ll fight to the death for my kids–but its taken me years and years to fight for myself. I mean really fight–not just lip service or a faux toughness so well known on my paternal side of the family. One of the last things that my last therapist said to me that still at my age, I avoid conflict at almost any cost. Can it be any wonder? I did not go out of my way to look for these situations. I wandered into them as a young woman, or in this case a teenager. I married a monster is what I did–one that even my mother said reminded her of my father at the time. But, how does a teenager put that into perspective, especially when things are feeling so good in the moment? So, the bottom line is that I married that which I was familiar with. With age and experience one can see it. It evolved into one mess on top of another.

“Je Maintiendra”
The racist, entitled, pig who was never a police officer-but was very violent in terms of what he thought he could get away with. (abt. 21 &20 yrs. old)

A wee bit of a change of subject. Black lives certainly do matter. That is beyond any reasonable demand for a person who is reasonable. Of course they matter. I would not take that fact away from a one of them. They do have 400 years of history behind them (at least!) that still plays in their life on a day to day basis. They deserve a much better deal than what has been handed to them by the white culture, patriarchy, & government. Beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Myself & oldest (mid 30’s now). By this time in my life I had lived through so many insertions of alien items into my body including homemade “toys”–that for really the rest of our relationship, I did not want the man touching me. It is truly a miracle I managed to stay married as long as I did. I am about 23/24 years old here.  San Francisco, CA ca. 1985ish.

But, for far more than 400 hundred years women have been abused and mistreated by men. The biggest offenders seem to be white men, I could be wrong. The fact, that someone only one year older than I was at that time was capable of such heinous behavior just goes to show what has been handed down from generation to generation. He had to pick it up from somewhere right? The mentality? Nothing he ever did was or even could have been hinted at as being something needed for survival or any other good purpose. It was all about power, violence–keeping someone in their place mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually. It worked-I stayed married to him for nearly 16 years. When I finally realized the example I was setting for the kids–that is when I left. He did his damndest to stop it too. Keeping me up all night until I agreed to do things his way. Reminding me that I had some kind of thought deficient and could not see repercussions or consequences of my behavior on my own. Giving me stupid choices, actually believing that I’d pick the worst of them. How many of you were given this option when leaving your spouse: “You can have the kids and everything it takes to make them a home, or you can have the computer.” Even then, I looked at him and asked him what kind of idiot he thought I was. If he was willing to treat me like that, then in what horrible ways was he actually willing to hurt his children? If I could have expressed any of this in court papers at the time, I’d probably been given sole custody, if, I was believed. And for the most part I wasn’t. I wasn’t really believed by the courts until the end of the ordeal when he was stupid enough to speak his mind to a social worker after I gave Wesley up to the “system” to get him the mental health help he needed. She did not tell me everything he said.. just a little bit. She shook her head and said he was unbelievable, she looked at me, “How did you stay married to him for that long?” I believed marriage was scared and forever. I over heard a conversation between adults as a child that inferred that women/wives had a “duty” (which at this point really proves men feeling quite entitled). That along with active behavior on his part to make sure that I felt small and uncapable… that my feelings and dreams were not even close to acceptable or even apart of reality. That is how I stayed married that long. That night stick of his… it was part of a long, long horribly painful journey that I am fairly sure I will never be able to put in its place. Sad thing is…my story is no where near close to the worst out there, not over time, not over generations, not even in modern days. He damn near killed me, and if I had died, it would have been by my own hand. It came that close in the end. This is why — in my mind, though, I would never for a moment take away one second from the BLM movement, but , I do have to say that all lives matter. These entitled, racist pigs, regardless of color of skin (No where near all of them police) need to be brought under control. Too many people are hurt, too many are dying.