bell hooks

As part of my coping with this latest (and most traumatic) failed relationship I've been doing some soul searching that involves a lot of talking and lots of reading. The first book suggested to me was, unfortunately, a flaky spiritual text by one "Dr." Wayne Dyer, called The Sacred Self. (Note to readers of self-help books, if the copyright notice doesn't have their title in it, then they probably aren't a doctor except maybe in their publishers' minds...)

UPDATE- Dr. Dyer does have an Ed.D from Wayne State University. His "people" emailed me from the Emirates Bank International- I'm sure their lawyers would have followed if I didn't correct my oversight. Snarky comments will not be published, BTW.

Not being a fan of dualism (or of books laced with whole sections in point form)- I was steered towards The Will to Change- Men, Masculinity, and Love by bell hooks. If you read the link, hooks is an African-American feminist with some real teeth. She thinks feminism has become too academic, that the movement hasn't gotten back out to the community- go have a read.

In Will to Change she talks about the patriarchy and how it affects men. How it robs us of our emotional lives and sets us against the women in our lives. One of the striking sections that hit me like a hammer was this one, about a former partner of hers that had changed from a loving partner into an emotional abusive and foreign male- and (as she perceives it) the reasons behind it:

In the early years of our relationship he was extremely critical of male domination of women and children. Although he did not use the word "patriarchy," he understood its meaning and he opposed it. His gentle, quiet manner often lead folks to ignore him, counting him among the weak and powerless. By the age of thirty he began to assume a more macho persona, embracing the dominator model that he had once critiqued. Donning the mantle of patriarch, he gained greater respect and visibility. More women were drawn to him. He was noticed more in public spheres...

These changes in his thinking and behavior were triggered by his desire to be accepted and affirmed in a patriarchal workplace and rationalized by his desire to get ahead. His story is not unusual. Boys brutalized and victimized by patriarchy more often than not become patriarchal, embodying the abusive patriarchal masculinity that they once clearly recognized as evil. Few men brutally abused as boys in the name of patriarchal maleness courageously resist the brainwashing and remain true to themselves. Most males conform to patriarchy in one way or another.

While I was home my parents gave me a large copy of my graduation photo that they had made for me. As an eighteen year old there was a soft warmness in my eyes, an openness across my shoulders- relaxed. Now there is sarcastic hardness written across my face, I hold my body rigid and defensive. Afraid of someone taunting the gentle little loving boy that I miss so much- I hold up this barrier that is suffocating the things I used to hold dear about myself.

My intellect is a weapon instead of a strength. I'm physically repulsed by males i view as stronger or bigger than me- I typecast them as meatheads and make no effort to be nice to them. Somewhere inside I fear they will hit me. I flirt to gain constant reinforcement of my own desirability- but I fear being successful.

As I was leaving my dad gave me a big hug, teary eyed as he always is when I leave- and told me to go find that loving boy again- that he can be my ally and my strength. And I cried, too- and I will.

Thinking of loss

Since November there's been a lot of loss surrounding my family and I. In November, just after I had left my non-lucrative sales job, my Aunt Judy died of breast cancer that she had been fighting for 2 years. Due to my financial situation, I couldn't go be with my mother for the funeral. But I talked to her almost every second night on the phone.

She was very shaken by Judy's death. She was my mom's kid sister- and they had been very close while growing up. But there were years where they did not talk, due, mostly, to the manipulations of their step mother and their younger half sister.

Mom has been very concerned that my brothers and I aren't very close. We aren't. I'm not much like my older brother; my younger brother, too. They are both very happy, warm, loving fathers to my 2 nieces and nephews- but their families and wives and in-laws keep them pretty busy in the Maritimes, while my studies and work and play have kept me in Montreal most of my adult life.

When we do see each other- I do have so much to tell them- if I can get them alone for a moment. I want to hear them talk about their daily joys with their families, the fierce passions that lead them to wed their wives, their satisfaction in their jobs. The softness of their mornings together. I want to be convinced that if my life became like theirs that I, too, could be happy. Could be peacefully contented.

I want to hear it so badly. I want something akin to their lives for myself- I want to have a home and be loved unconditionally, to have and be an ally to my wife, to have security and raise beautiful, smart children who love themselves and their friends.

But they never say it. When I do try to evoke the discussion, I get nothing but the Disney tour of their lives. We tour from one posed photo to the next.

So, I leave- distant, I fill in the details of their lives with cliches I've seen on sitcoms. I don't call them often when I'm away, and I don't send them birthday cards very often.

My mom had a heart attack last year, followed just recently with my father's cancer scare. I went to be with them for a month. And I saw that my parents are just as distant with my brothers as I am. They try, they try so hard, but my brothers are oblivious to the pain this is causing them.

My mom and dad are worried that once they are gone that we brothers will all end up as strangers- that there will be nothing left of our family- in any real sense. That we will be diminished without the loving, close relationship like she had with her sister.

I wonder if we have all lost out on something already.