Riding the bus down to work this morning I was humming away on my anthropologie-inspired caplet when a rider gets on and sits across from me and he says, “Are you knitting me socks?” My response to this question is usually snarky, but all I could muster up today was a murmur and groan, hopefully hiding the boil in my blood system.

I am the kind of knitter that knits wherever I go. This means that whenever I am knitting in public space someone feels entitled to comment. Often it’s from flight attendants, old men who wanna talk to a sweet young lady, and middle-aged women who think that younger women aren’t domestic anymore. I find it annoying and invasive for a few reasons:

First, I started out as a knitter who knit for others but that’s over now. I knit for myself and love it! I feel a sense in pride in letting down my “must do whatever I’m good at for other people” guard and making self-crafting my personal mantra. Why stop now?

Second, it’s not okay for men to think that the knitting they see me do in public is for them, even if it’s a way to talk to me. Way to start off on a bad foot! Women and knitters are not here to serve strangers with our crafts.

Third, the women who ask me what I’m knitting or when I started knitting don’t bother me as much, but I get irked when they say they used to knit but got too busy being a mom and working to knit and never picked it up again, as if I’m young and I can knit whenever I want without life repercussions. Also, I’m not fond of the refrain, “You don’t see many women doing that these days”. Because we are.

Now that my rant is over (phew!) I’m going to go back to knitting in public and maybe, just maybe, I’ll not be so tired next time and let it out.

Challenge of the week: assert a boundary.

It was a rough weekend and the new week isn’t any more smooth.

I decide to just take care of myself and let the crises in my life sort themselves out. I order the medium instead of the default small. I let the dishes sit over night. I get a massage.

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Today on The Kitchn there was an article about The Perfect Tomato Sandwich and it reminded me of Harriet’s struggle with her mastery of cutting a tomato.

I always felt kind of childish watching the Harriet the Spy movie with my little sister. I was in high school and “kid” movies like that weren’t supposed to make me cry! Especially since I read the book when I was a wee one. I think what I liked most about the story was that it was about a curious young girl who had a love for tomato sandwiches and an ability to have incredibly true emotions for a young fictional person. I love the part in the movie where Harriet is fighting with her mom about being a big enough person to cut the tomato for her sandwich, but her mom gives her a butter knife and splat goes the tomato. Oh the angst of the pre-teen. Didn’t her mother know that she was an amazing spy and had the skills to use a sharp knife?

It was that moment of her struggling with the tomato that I took on the tomato sandwich as my daily I’m-a-new-vegetarian lunch. I mean, if this cool spy can relish in the tomato sandwich its simplicity was good for me!

Reading about the latest anti-choice militancy to end abortion in Canada sure does make me wonder why we in the pro-choice community are not organizing more.

On September 23rd, the always-contradictory titled “40 Days For Life” campaign (as if beliveing in choice does not equate wanting the best life possible for you and your offspring?) starts in Ottawa, where anti-choicers will be protesting across abortion clinics and generally making a scene with their condemning antagonistic message.

These religiously-based gatherings garner hundreds to thousands of participants in support; the “March for Life” alone had over 10 000 attendees this past May.

Does the number of people who show up make what they are doing right? Absolutely not, there are several historical attrocities around the world that have occured which prove that the masses following one state of mind can be quite dangerous, however there is definitely some apathy around defending choice in Canada that it would be nice to do something about. Especially as the younger generation whose ovaries and vaginas are the ones people are attempting to make decisions over for us.

We’ve got a lot to pay attention to in regards to restricting reproductive freedom in this great country of ours. While we might be the only Western nation with unrestricted access to abortion, a closer look at what’s happened in the past six months might make you gather some friends together and stand up for the right to choose.

It’s just too bad that it so often takes the threat of losing something to act on keeping it. But several actions and events are planned for the next year so stay tuned, we need you!

As some of you may know, a week from now I’ll be a married woman. Since my partner and I decided on Valentine’s day earlier this year that we wanted to be wed, I’ve navigated the strange world of the “wedding industrial complex” and tried to figure out, on my own terms, what it means to me to be a married feminist. That meant dissecting the tradition bit by bit and disposing of things that didn’t feel right for me (changing my name, my Dad giving me away, legal paperwork, a white dress), but it also meant having to justify a lot of the things that did (bridesmaids, a limo, an expensive pair of shoes, and a hair and makeup appointment.)

Here at Shameless we’ve talked about how it can sometimes be difficult for feminist writers to talk about their healthy relationships, and we’ve also talked about wedding pressures on women that seem to supercede love, and one’s feminist beliefs. (And then there’s marriage traditions that supercede sanity, but that’s another post entirely.) In the end, I feel like both of us have been true to the things we love and hate about declaring your lifelong partnership to your community, and although at times it’s been hard to negotiate satisfying our own needs and the needs of those we care about (okay Mom, we can have flowers), I think overall we’ve done a pretty good job. Getting married and planning an event to celebrate that transition has been a wonderful way to solidify not only my feminist beliefs in the context of my relationship and my community, but to understand the value of compromise and understanding. I’ve always been very anti-marriage for a variety of reasons, but I realized that it is possible to make a public promise to the person you love without sacrificing who you are or what you believe.

Sure, there will still be people who will be disappointed because they didn’t get a monogrammed wedding favour or a chicken or beef option, and there will be folks who don’t think we’re “really married” because we didn’t go the legal route, but what really matters is how we view our (personally defined) committment to each other.

So in honour of the planning being close to over, I thought I’d post a video of one of my favourite married couples singing about exactly what I think marriage should be.

Extra special wedding-related bonus from our beloved Joss Whedon (which will likely make it into a wedding speech) after the jump.

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I’m a huge fan of rap and like many other things in this world, some of it has become commercialized, misogynized, and otherwise distorted from where it started.

Lest we forget that rap was born out of an activist movement. Grandfathers from the early days of its creation include politikin’ movers and shakers like Public Enemy, Grand Master Flash, and KRS-One who courageously spoke out about the grave injustices in oppressed communities of colour.

I get fed up of hearing that rap is only about hating on women or just talks about cash money and cars.

I’m not saying there isn’t a lot of that out there, but I definitely don’t see the same type of subject matter criticism towards various bubble-gum pop stars like Hilary Duff or Miley Cyrus who confuse me every time they sing about not conforming (but maybe they get left alone more with how they present it since they are nice, pretty, light-skinned girls?)

In comes Eekwol, who is an incredibly gifted Native rapper from Saskatoon, giving it to you straight up to let the truth be known. A Cree from the Muskoday First Nation, she not only makes me brim with pride from a cultural and musical perspective, but also as a woman. As you’ll see very quickly from any of her songs or listening to her talk, she clearly owns all of who she is.

Watch her shine in this interview about the role of gender in rap:

And do yourself a favour and stop by her Myspace page to listen on in to some deep tunes that really get to the heart of the issues so many of our communities are facing (the “Respect Your History” song gives me chills every time I hear it).

We are in the age where words like “diversity”, “multiculturalism”, and Canada being a “mosaic” are being thrown around quite a bit, often without a full explanation or understanding as to where people are coming from using this kind of terminology.

Personally, as a woman of colour, I’ve always had a little trouble reconciling myself to use these words and feel like I’m doing them justice (especially that multiculturalism one, since when I look outside of Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal I don’t really see it and that’s only 3 cities in all of Canada). For me, it’s actually more important to comprehend the vast dynamics of power and privilege and how that has historically and is presently playing into everything we do.

I came across this interesting Youtube video which is one person’s interpretation of what diversity really means.

What does it all mean to you?

Modofly is an artists’ collaborative run by “jack of all trade artists/designers” Jordan and Kevin. They make these hip-looking notebooks and are currently seeking submissions for new artwork for their next run of notebooks. And this time they’re requesting art within two themes, “Girly” and “Femme”.

We are looking for work that women and girls alike will gush over. We have been accused by some of the female folk of being weak on the feminine front with our books, so we want you to help us solve this (Okay, we get it! Kez and I are boy nerds full of tech lust, and you need to show us the way). So send us work that your girlfriend will gush over, your mom will kiss you for, your wife will give you some marital points, or a new mom will get down to filling with all the details of life.

My response is as follows:

First, recognizing you have a “gap” might be the first step, but asking for “girly” art does not necessarily make you any more inclusive.

Second, not all women and girls in the art and craft world are the same. It might not happen that “women and girls alike will gush over” the work.

Third, I’m kind of happy you’ve been accused of being too masculine in your work and art. I just wish you had chosen a word other than “accused”, which makes it sound like you’re the victim.

Fourth, it’s not our job to “show you the way”.

Fifth, your final sentence makes it sound like you want boys to send you work that the women and girls in their lives will buy. That’s so progressive guys!

I wanted to share this with the Shameless world since I’m a little baffled by the occurence.

Recently I wrote a piece for a place that shall remain nameless. In it I recounted my recent trip to the United States and all the great Native youth engagement work, which happened to include the cultural and spiritual journey my partner and I have decided to embark on.

The comment I received back went something like this “You need to refocus your writing since you seem to dwell too much on your boyfriend and that’s nobody’s business”.

Not once did I even say anything REMOTELY romantic. Not once did I refer to my own feelings about him. I didn’t even say his name. I like to keep it real so if he happened to be there while community work was going on and positively contribute to it, I’m going to say it. Just like I referenced what everybody else did.

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