Hi everyone,
I’ve uploaded 2 songs written and performed by Patty Griffen, with the lyrics. These two songs really resonate with me and some of the things we’ve spoken of in class. The first is titled Tony, and addresses teen suicide caused by the bullying that many young LGBTQAA people are confronted with, and the unfairness, isolation and lonliness that can lead to hopelessness. This is why Sedgwick really spoke to my heart. I have felt that kind of hopelessness in my life, and was “talked off the edge” when a therapist gave me a book to read, which forever changed my outlook on suicide, and the terrible legacy left behind for the ones who have lost someone to the forever decision. The book is free and available online.
http://www.qprinstitute.com/forever.html
When I revealed to my ex-husband and children the depression that almost took my life, we started an honest dialog of moments in their lives where they experienced that kind of hopelessness, also entertaining the idea. Thank God we spoke about it, because I never knew they had felt that kind of pain too. We all cried when the reality of the magnitude of grief we could have felt at such a horrible loss hit us. In shock, we promised each other that we will always reach out to one another when hopelessness feels like it will rip your soul apart. When your heart is so swollen and raw that it threatens to break your ribs to be free of you, filling you with fear and certainty that things will never change and there is no other way out, please remember that there is. Getting past the pain in that moment might seem impossible, but there are alternatives to a forever decision. The alarming reality is that those who know someone who have taken their lives are at a much higher risk of making the same choice. This devastating legacy is called the suicide contagion, because it spreads like a malignant tumor, invasive and deadly, pulling others into the grave as well. Death is not pretty, romantic, or reversible.
The second song, “Change”, is about how women are forced to conform, to keep in line with what someone else thinks we ought to be. In this song, it happens in little increments of passive/aggressive acts of “love”, because those who love us want what’s best for us, right? And every time we accept or adopt the changes that are suggested, we lose a little bit of ourselves, until the only thing that’s left isn’t recognizable at all anymore, not even to ourselves. Professor Kersh printed out a part of “Adrienne Rich’s Poetry and Prose” for me, the section titled Compulsory Heterosexuality, and I am forever thankful for the clarity the piece has brought to my awareness and how things really are for women in the present heterocentric system. (no, I haven’t become a hater, just pissed off) So I think the next time I hear someone say something like, “I think you should wear THAT dress” instead of what I’ve chosen, I’ll answer with, fuck off!