summer update

Hey girls (and guys ),

just a quick update to let you know where I’m at those days. I don’t have much time to update this blog any more frequently (partly because my internet is just so slow, it is ridiculous), but I’ll try to write a couple of articles in the next few days.

Now. You might have noticed that I do keep on updating my links list on this blog. There are a lot of lesbian sites out there, but the good ones are somewhat more rare, so I am trying to filter all this out for you. The list is growing so check it out. The very last add is : The lesbian postcast (very, very good website, I recommend it. Politics, gossip, culture, chat, blogs, and more).

Anyhow, there a couple of gay, asexual, transgenders and their friends websites on the list, but I really focus more on lesbian-related websites (and women of colour, but not exclusively). If you speak french, there are a few french websites as well. Since there are also some adult websites, make sure not to click on whatever link you see. The names are tricky sometimes.

Yep, yep, I’m still in the closet (I know, I really do need a shot of courage right now), but I’m still in the process of getting out. Thanks to all of you who wrote to me!

Close-minded parents of gay teens

My dad is very close-minded. And I don’t think that he actually realises that he his. He’s very self-righteous too. He believes that some things are normal and that others aren’t, and that everybody ought to be as “normal” as he is. And at times, it’s really hard to talk to him because he just says: “I don’t want to know anything about this” and walks away.

The other day, though, I had this amazing opportunity to actually have a conversation with him. I asked him how was his sister doing. It is no secret that those two don’t get along very well. They don’t see each other and they don’t talk. I had previously talked about my dad about denial, I said in a very general way that I was scared that he would deny me if ever I do something he doesn’t approve. My dad is very protective. He’s the cliché dad that doesn’t want his daughter to go out with bad boys, you know ? We used to joke about this, but recently, I started to use that cliché to slowly come out to him and my mom. I would say : “Seriously, Dad, if ever I fell in love with a gangster or a guy with tattoos and piercings and stuff, would you deny me ?” (Add to that a cute pity face, it works ) Of course, what was really in my head was: “If ever I present you to my new girlfriend, would you deny me ?” And of course, he says he doesn’t deny anybody. That’s my dad.

But anyway, it worked for me to use the “bad boy” cliché to push him to realise that yes, I am (or should be) free to fall in love with anybody. That is my step one in my coming out process. Yay. Not much, I know. But better than nothing.

So we talked (in a very general way, not about homosexuality at all) and I managed to make him realise that he doesn’t do any compromises when it comes to relationships and things that he doesn’t necessarily approve. I added that he judges people before he gets to know them (he would often say that if ever one of his friends announced him that he / she was gay / lesbian, he would stop their relationships with no hesitation at all no matter how many decades they have been friends. He would also say that if he knows that somebody is gay, he wouldn’t even talk to that person even if he has too). At the end of that lovely father-daughter conversation, he said: “Yeah. You are right, I might think about it.” Isn’t cool ? There is hope in that family ! Yay !  

I also used the “fat person” version (because – and I’m not proud to say this – my dad would also judge fat people in the exact same way as he would do with gay people, and it just depresses me). I would say: “You will deny me if I get fat.” And he would honestly say no.

So I highly recommend this technique to anybody that wants to come out of the closet to his / her parents. Just to prepare them to the big announcement. Of course, I’m no expert. It’s just an advice. Take it or leave it. So far, my dad really watched what he would say about people he would used to judge. And that is why we love our dads too.

Step 2 of my coming out process coming up soon.

Lesbian Couple give birth to quadruplets separately

Karen Wesolowski and Martha Padgett spent three years and £35,000 undergoing IVF treatment, but could not believe it when they heard four heartbeats at a check-up. Astonishingly each of the women gave birth to twins on the same day – but the four children born are actually quadruplets, created from Martha’s eggs and donor sperm. Miss Wesolowski, who has been with her… (read more)

Karen, 42, and Martha, 38, tried 5 times to get pregnant (at 15,000$ per try, a three years process that exhausted them) before they finally decided that they should both have eggs implanted. They took medication to make sure they were on the same cycle. Even though they knew that 2 embryos had been implanted, they didn’t believe that they would end up with 4 babies. And, happy end, they gave birth on the same date, only 22 hours apart at different hospitals. Now the pair, of Riverside, California, are happily cradling twins – one boy and one girl each – who are all quadruplet brothers and sisters. That is a real love story, eh ? And Martha, who have a 3-years-old daugther named Julia from a previous marriage, says she dated a couple of other men and never expected to fall in love with another women, until she met Karen. Couple of years later: lots of babies.

Am I out of the closet ?

Of course not. I mean… are you serious ?! There is no escape for me, unfortunately. My family is pretty homophobic, especially my father. Gosh, sometimes he says things that are just so awful…  I consider myself quite young (maybe too young) to break my family apart. They don’t want this, neither do I. I know someday it will happen. Just not now. Let’s just say I’m not ready to come out of the closet just now. It is so easy to say: just do it, this is who you are. Of course, I wish to everyone to be out of the closet and be accepted. It’s just not that simple. Not only would my sexual orientation break my family apart, to be totally honest, I am scared like hell of my father. There are so much things that happened in his life and in my life and in our life as a family and knowing that his daughter is lesbian would just be too much, I guess. I am just afraid of what he would do like I’m sleeping, if you know what I mean… Seriously, it’s not even funny. At time, he just so violent. But anyway. My father is pretty much the main reason why I keep a low profile about this. Better off this way.

There is nothing else much to say about this. Except that for the moment, my only alternative to this unfortunate situation is to move out in Ontario (probably Ottawa or Toronto) after my CEGEP studies. In other words: Cut any type of relationship with my family. They won’t know anything about who I would be living with nor how my life is like. I would just be gone.

Well… Nobody knows what the future holds.

Sorry about that

Yep. I haven’t been writting for quite a few weeks (months ?). Anyway. You know. School. Friends. Family. Life. Annnnd I’ve been sick. Sick enough to stay 2 days in hospital. I’ll write new articles soon (I got plenty of drafts only waiting to be published^^).
Feels good to be back.

Who likes ZE romance ? – Black lesbians books

Who likes ZE romance ?

Did you ever wonder where the lesbian literature is  hiding ? I did. Not for long, I have to admit, but yes, I did. I’ve never really been into any kind of soap or romance lit (it’s just a question of taste). I personally am a lot more into coming of age, XXe century, contemporary and young adult fiction. But sometimes, I think every reader likes to read something lighter, just for entertainment. So here is a list of a couple of authors who write books on lesbianism, and especially on black lesbians (just because it’s somewhat harder to find then just lesbian books). Enjoy.

The Gilda Stories: A Novel by Jewelle Gomez.

Abeng by Michelle Cliff.

Bliss by Fiona Zedde: Zedde’s first fiction effort features Bliss Sinclair, a New York publishing executive that is looking for love in all the wrong places. After dumping her boyfriend and in turn being seduced and abandoned by Regina Velasquez, a lesbian player into sex but not into long-term relationships, Sinclair travels to her birthplace, Jamaica, in hopes of restoring her emotional balance. Love enters Sinclair’s life in the sexy person of Hunter Willoughy, a Jamaican woman who is all about loving women.

Zami: A New Spelling of My Name (Crossing Press Feminist Series) by Audre Lorde.

The Gilda Stories: A Novel by Jewelle Gomez : The central character of this multiracial, feminist, lesbian vampire romance fantasy travels through time and leads multiple lives. Throughout her lives, Gilda is a woman of African descent with strong feminist traits and a sense of loyalty to her friends and family, both mortal and immortal. In her first life, she is a runaway slave in Louisiana in 1850, not yet a vampire, not yet named, who stabs a rapist/bounty hunter in self-defense. Rescued and adopted by Gilda, a vampire who runs a brothel, she soon becomes a vampire herself and adopts Gilda’s name. Subsequent lives take Gilda to California in 1890, Missouri in 1921, Massachusetts in 1955, New York in 1981 where she does a stint as a cabaret singer, and into the future in New Hampshire in 2020 and up to the year 2050. Gomez provides an unusual twist to the erotic vampire novel, introducing issues of race and sexual preference, but there is no attempt to address these issues except as fodder for an ultimately uninteresting romance novel.

Leave of Absence by S. Renée Bess.

Undercover by Laurinda D. Brown.

Twins in Black and White + the DNA of Adam

Germany, July 11, 2008. An interracial couple become new parents with two beautiful twins boys. One is White, the other is Black. Rare, but not impossible. The little boys’s names are Ryan and Leo. The mother is from Ghana and the father is from Postdam, Germany.  ”None of us could believe it,” said the Lichtenberg maternity ward’s head doctor, Birgit Weber, adding that “both kids have definitely the same father.” Ryan, who came first, weighing 2.650 kgs, has light colored skin, blue eyes, and dark hair. His brother Leo, weighing 2.606 kgs, looks like his mother, with dark skin and dark eyes. Ryan has been described by his mother as ‘noisy,’ while Leo is a lot calmer.

The twins were delivered by Caesarean section in a Berlin hospital on July 11, but were kept from the public for six days. The probability of different colored twins being born even to a mixed-race couple is extremely rare. Doctors believe that the ‘genetic surprise’ might have occurred as one of the mother’s ancestors was white or one of the father’s ancestors was black.

Isn’t that amazing ? And so beautiful. This just proves how pueril and meaniless race really is. Not socially, but biologically. We create, as a society the racism. Racism is just so stupid. Did anyone see the Discovery Channel’s documentary on the DNA of Adam ? I’m really not into science and stuff, but the DNA is just so… infinite and amazing. I mean, one of my ancestor could have been white ! My parents are from Haiti where it’s really multi ethnic, partly because of the history of this country. The Spanish came, and the French and… anyway, I don’t believe in that pure race kind of speech that some people have. It’s just so ridiculous. There is nothing pure in DNA. DNA is links and links and links and links. I’m amazed.   I mean, this is how I like religion. I like it when it links with science. I’m not a believer. I need proofs and something reliable. This documentary is a must see !

 

Black Hair – My hair journey

For too many little black girls, it was a childhood ritual, like pouring make-believe tea. I would take a pajama top, drape it over my head, and with its sleeves trailing down my back, pretend that the cotton nightshirt was, instead, a flowing mane of hair, like the Breckgirl’s, or maybe Jaclyn Smith’s on “Charlie’s Angels” — neither of whom looked a thing like me. Now mind you, I was no self-hater. I grew up with (read more)

What’s the big deal with black woman’s hair ? Everything. I put on the pyjama top as a child, pretending to look like Britney spears, Christina Aguilera, Michelle from Destiny’s child or Jennifer Lopez. Like many others. I permed my hair from 11 to 15 years-old. My mama had asked me if I wanted to, I thought: “Thank God, finally !“ To me, long and straight hair was synonym of beauty. The Stars had them and the stars decided everything fashion and beauty. Destiny’s child, Halle Berry, Spice Girls, Britney, Jennifer Lopez, Alicia Keys… I believe that to my mother, permed hair meant a transition between girlhood and womanhood. I was 11 years-old, I wanted to please and attract people and to me, permed hair was the only solution. Long and straight hair was like a permission to flirt because only woman had long and straight hair. At 11 years-old, I felt like a woman already. Now that I think about it, I think that’s really funny and silly. It’s innocent… And destructive.

www.essencehaircorp.com/TEXTURES.html.

Perm hair is the demon. No jokes. At least, it was for me. I grew up, went in High school. At an age where teenagers discover themselves, I was wondering why wasn’t it okay to have kinky and curly hair ?…. Why wasn’t okay to just be myself ? Naturally. When I asked my mom about the hair and when I told her that maybe I could perhaps, possibly go back to natural hair, she laughed and said: “Curly hair is for little girls.“ Months have gone by, and basically, my hair could not handle the permed. I wasn’t taking care of them anyway. I didn’t want to. I learned to hate them. They were not me. They were not mine and they did not represent who I was. I felt like society and even the Black community around me was sending me this negative message: “Be someone else. Being yourself is not good enough.“ As you all know, I was dealing with self-esteem problems and my hair did not help me. And plus, I always felt that permed hair was just so ridiculous on me. I am Black, why should I play White ? I did NOT agree. Black hair is as good as white hair.

And so, at 13-14: Total rebellion. Well, almost, lol. I began to wear braids because I had took off the perm and my hair was just so damaged. It was somewhat of a middle ground. My hair was artificially long, but it looked more natural then permed hair. I did not want to play a role anymore. I mean, why should natural hair be inappropriate at a certain age if it’s, well, let me think… NATURAL ! So for two- two and a half years, I went through this dread-transition period. At 15-16, I began to wear my beautiful natural hair. Proudly.

At first, I just attached them in a pony tail. No, going back to natural hair was not easy. People’s gazes and looks (especially from the Black community) kind of bothered me at first. It was as if they were telling me: “WTF ?!?“ I don”t know. They may as well as thought: “Oh, natural sister !“ or just “Nice“, you know ? Still. It was probably just not common to see natural hair especially at my age (as a teen). Gradually, I began to wear twists (like in the picture… No, it’s not me.). Many, many different twists. Gosh, I really had some really bad hair days ! But it was… necessary, I guess. I had to find the way my hair looked better on me. It’s like a long and difficult communication between me and my hair. I looooove my natural hair.

I mean, twists are twists are twists. You know ? But twists are just so unique depending on who wears them and who did them and your hair type and length and strength… Next, I would like to try even more different hair styles. Twists-out and fros are cool. I may try to use a texturizer as well before doing my twists.

Before I start boring you about my hair (that you had never seen anyway ), let me just say that I really honestly wish that beauty would stop be this really plastic skinny girl with long blond hair and all. It’s 2008. Beauty is everywhere, in every face, in every hair, in every skin. L’oréal didn’t get that, obviously. They denied having lighten Beyoncé’s skin. Good joke. L’Oréal is like the most plastic-like and superficial compagny ever. Now, little girls put their pyjama tops on their head trying to look like Beyoncé because they think “Wow, I can lighten and become as beautiful as she is !“ The reality is different, though. Of course, Beyoncé is gorgeous. But she’s fake, like every single other star. She’s hidden under makeup, I’m telling you. Don’t put a pyjama top on your head. It’s silly.

I’m not saying that Permed hair or extension or whatever unatural isn’t beautiful. It is beautiful. What I’m unhappy about is that it just seems that straigh hair is seen as the only beauty. I’m not angry at every black woman with unatural hair. I don’t care what you do about your hair, it’s your choice. Just saying: It’s NOT an OBLIGATION !

http://z.about.com/d/movies/1/0/y/1/N/clerkspremiere06.jpg

You know that girl on Cold Case, Tracie Thoms ? Love love love love her hair! Absolutely beautiful.