love, patriarchy, and functionality

i'm going to stream:

so i've been watching porn for the past two hours. not because i am consciously watching it, but like a background noise. i'm desensitized to the fake moans and the rough slaps on her ass. i don't like that he chokes her. my friend is chatting with me and actually likes choking a girl while he's fucking her. he says it's a power thing...or for balance. it's painful watching this sexual violence that is lodged into my subconscious...i just watch it..numbing...familiar with the way these women feel. imagining the men who have done these positions. men who believe this is the way to intimacy. that's what i thought at least. i thought that sex would get me to a better place. a deep place. i mean after you cum, all the walls are shed and you become vulnerable....i become needy. needy because i've shared such a deeper part of who i am and want to share more with this one person. granted, sometimes...it's JUST sex. other times, it's a yearn for an insatiable satisfaction. something very impossible to share between a couple in my opinion...unconditional love. i want to give my soul to someone...not just anyone but the one who will understand me. i don't know what it is. this love ideal. see me at my worst and best...be my best friend...see the details of my being and love me for it...yeah love the details of my being

and again, i will say that i do believe people have more than one soul mate, but it's not the same. romantic companionship is very different from other forms of friendships

definitely i have trust issues. it's hard for me to say this. from my past actions it may not seem true, but i feel i can be very loyal to a person. when i want someone or something then i really want something or someone...and the moment a person does me wrong or hurts me in any way then i will run to save my life...and maybe that's MY problem...that i cannot promise unconditional love to another person unless i know 1000% that they will be unconditional with me....and i guess it's no longer a person i'm chasing, nor an ideal...but values...and the combination of values that makes me feel more connected to a person. <3, not c=3.

in bell hooks's The Will To Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love, she discussed how men have no outlet for their emotions. however, when i was with calvin and became that outlet for his pain. yet i didn't know at that time what to do with someone so broken. and for some reason i thought about his relationship with his father, and my other ex's relationship to his father, and my crush's relationship to his father. all the splintered pieces seemed so small and intricate and i didn't have the patience or skill to put them back together into a whole puzzle again. and this is where i lie at fault in all of my relationships (moreso romantic ones than friendships, but both nonetheless). for example, my girlfriends can tell me about their lives and i will stand as the feminist fighting for their empowerment and support them as a sistah soulja. but i can't do this with my men. i never say to them "hey! stick it to the man." for females it is very easy for me to point fingers to our male counterparts. but our male counterparts suffer from the same system. and though they inherit privilege, it is just as damaging to inherit it without having a conversation about what it means to have such power.

how can i demand a man to be emotional and open with me when i have these standards for who he should be as a man? i see him as tough, protector, the person to soothe me, rather than offering my own self as a tough, strong, protector, provider, counselor for him. and i am wrong...so very wrong to not have loved my men equally the way they loved me. this is where i have been spoiled to believe that i deserved more of their love and when i didn't get it, i threw tantrums...

this is all rooted back to my father....and my lack of relationship with him post-birth of becka. i was angry that he had left me for her, unconsciously angry. vividly though i would write "Don't invite Becka and Dad to my wedding" assured by my childhood spite that i would have another man save me from the family, would replace that father-daughter love.

my father's rage is also very vivid to me. the red in his eyes, the tightness of his mouth and jaw. He would yell in Vietnamese, "Jaw leh!" He'd become possessed and foreign. From that rage seeded in mine and my brother's memories, we learned patriarchy. Being put back into our place as children who didn't know better. this happened often, a game to get my father's attention, to push his buttons after a long day. but there wasn't a day when we had a conversation with him, just expected each other to act in certain ways, play out those roles. it became more apparent when he was diagnosed with hepatitis c. in my journal entries, i read and remember being afraid that he would die. He was tired and his patience worn thin, but we never talked about it; we just couldn't. the fear of our father instilled in us this silence. he remained silent as well because patriarchy couldn't offer him the space in society to voice his own emotions, his own fears about his illness.

Adultism--the disease of our society. we were relentless and unforgiving to the man who gave his life to work for our benefit. both he and we unthinking, yelled, beat, hit, abused our powers as humans. we were capable of so much damage. my mother never said a thing, and for that, she betrayed her own children. we rebelled against her as well. we raised hell back in those days.

women also reinforce these gender roles. i called my mom and asked if ah-gong ever hit her. she said, "no he was really nice. he was always too high to hit us. only gramma did." then i called my gramma and asked her if her parents hit her. she said no. so i challenged her on where or how she learned to be abusive. rightfully so she said that she was pressured to be the provider for her children. without the support of ah-gong and the "acting out" of her kids, she could only channel that energy into verbal and physical abuse. this paragraph is to demystify the ideas of men only being abusive. my grampa never hit my gramma but there was an emotional negligence and lack of communication about shared roles. who is to be provider, who were to take care of the kids, who was to make dinner, etc...

it is only now how i see the functionality of my parents's relationship. there is playfulness, conversations, shared roles, and commitment. and example of my parents teasing each other:

moi: Mom, did you have a lot of boyfriends?
moma:i had a really rich one, but gramma said no
me: what happened?
moma: he was eight years older.
me: so then what'd gramma say about dad
moma: boooy maaaw ah.....not baad
::break into hysterical laughter::

me: how long did you guys date before you guys got married?
moma: a few months
pops: yeah lucky too. if we were this age, and single, no one would want us
moma: no one would want US?!
::tap-kicks dad in the butt::
moma: no one would want YOU, you mean! plenty of guys want me
::more hysterical laughter::

and an example of shared roles: my dad drives the kids to school every day for 22 years and going. my mom takes gramma to all her doctor appointments. my dad cleans up mia's poop and feeds the canaries while mom cleans the kitchen. both of them switch off doing dishes.

at night, or in the car driving from work to home, they talk about customers, the kids, current events, their past lives and dreams....and they both have a commitment to provide for us, kids. they work together, sleep together, eat together. kinda like the way sherwynn and mike knox function. weird.

I remember some time in college i asked my dad why he hit us. he said he didn't know any better either. and there were moments in time when i called him to ask for advice. but even the process of walking on soft grass after walking on cement and glass hurts. one can't appreciate it, scared to hold on to the softness because it may not be forever. scared to cling to softness because patriarchy taught us all to be harder than we really are. i cannot trust who will stay with me. i cannot trust god or life because people get taken away.

so i've told spiritual self to believe and remember that our bodies are temporal and when we die we become connected to the greater collective consciousness....and sometimes they come back in dreams, our parallel world. and i write these down because i'm afraid i might forget him...my father...scared that i would have missed all those times to have talked to him about how i felt, what i think and believe, and how much i really do love him...for all that he does...for all that he is...

and the same for all the men in the world who never felt like they were enough...and the women in the world who never felt like they were enough. let's talk about how much we love one another. and how much we love ourselves...take care...self-care....this life we live is only a dream and we might as well live it out with what we've got.

and for my child, i'd like to raise you in a community where you can learn from people who may not be biologically yours but can teach you by being great role models...mentors....even the bad ones are mentoring you to be better.