The Vagina Monologues

The Vagina Monologues have been part of my life since I picked up a copy of Eve Ensler's printed version of the play during high school.  When I was a first year at Rhodes, I went into Blount Auditorium with some friends and watched and laughed really hard, even though my face was probably beet red the whole time.  For the next three years, I had a speaking role in the Monologues and it was always a favorite part of my year.  Participating provided such a good opportunity to meet new and amazing people and to push myself personally (stage fright and Southern sensibilities made being on a stage for the purpose of talking about vaginas doubly challenging but also insanely fun) while being part of a movement that, while it might be complicated and problematic in terms of what it is trying to do by stretching the play globally and what is saying about women, is also doing something that is undoubtedly important.  

This year, the fabulous Andrea Tedesco asked for student submissions to the monologues so I wrote something about vaginas and me.

Thanks to Andrea and all the cast and crew for making a vagina safe space at Rhodes.  I wish I could have been there to see it!

I love talking about vaginas.  Academically, socially, politically, in a large group of people or over dinner with friends, I am all about a good vagina conversation. I love my vagina and appreciate all vaginas and want them to be comfortable and have all the rights they deserve.    

But getting here was a process.    

   

If I went back five or ten years, things would be different.  Back then, I hated my vagina. I hated my sexuality.  I was insufferable, angsty little lesbian that I was.  

I wish I could go back for a minute, catch myself holed up in my room, wearing a terrible puka shell choker and reading bad fanfiction.  There would be Buffy the Vampire Slayer box sets on the bookshelves (some things never change) and Nirvana on the stereo.  There would be posters of muscled men on the wall, God help me.  

I would tell myself this:

Now, I know you have all the feelings but you don't have to let them turn you into some miserable monster.  The family calls this room the cave for a reason; you're the scary thing that lives down here. 

So check yourself.  Appreciate the people in this world who love you.   

One day those awful journal entries will be nothing more than a good laugh and a slightly shameful blush as you read them aloud to your girlfriend. She'll laugh with you and beg to hear more and you'll hide your face in a pillow but turn the page and keep reading anyway.   

When you finally tell them, your friends will still love you.  Some of them already know, and they're just waiting on you to say it.  No, there's no magical gaydar, but I will tell you that there are only so many times that you can talk about sleeping with a woman before it becomes obvious that it's not a passing interest.     

There will be rough patches.  For all their good intentions, our friends and family will not understand some things. They will hurt your feelings, over and over. 

"Love the sinner, hate the sin." 

"I'll pray for you."

Things with Dad will get worse before they get better.  He will say: 

"Gays deserve what they get from AIDS.  They brought it on themselves.  Monkey fuckers."

His wife will say, 

"I hope you can change."  

You'll get stronger and learn that Dad's wrong, absolutely, and that you have no responsibility to keep pretending like he isn't spouting hateful bullshit.  You will always love him but it won't always mean that you have to hate yourself a little, too. 

Talking about sex and your own sexuality will not always be so painful.  It will eventually be something you love.  You'll spend lots of time talking about vaginas.  I know it's hard to believe.  

You will get asked the following question at least 50 times, sometimes from drunk friends at wine night, sometimes abashedly, over coffee. 

"Okay, I just have to ask, how does scissoring work?" 

You don't know now, and you won't know then.  It doesn't work, outside of porn.  Maybe for members of Cirque du Soleil?  Anyway. Your friends will be briefly disappointed and move on to questions about strap ons. 

Then there's this.  

"Just don't be one of those lesbians."  

Of course what she means, what they all mean, is don't be butch. 

Unfortunately, we are.

Fortunately, we are.

I want to tell you now, because it's important: 

There is more than one kind of woman. 

I know it feels like you're failing, all the time, but you're not. You're just different, scary as that is.   

There will be at least two awkward haircuts on the way to what our brother calls the "soldier look," but one day you will leave the dorm room in a blazer and button down and feel like your clothes fit your personality.  Finding clothes for your body type?  Another issue entirely, but don't worry, that will work out too.  

In time, you will come to own your butchness and to love it, and women will find it attractive and pull you closer to them by the tie you're wearing, picked as carefully as any pair of shoes or earrings.  

You'll fall in love and it will not be like the movies, but what movie ever told your story anyway?  Even when it ends, you'll be grateful for every moment.  She'll be smart and funny and beautiful and she'll get you a bowtie for Christmas.  Yes, bowties are cool.  Better, she thinks they're sexy.  

On that note, you will not live in abstinence forever.  

College will be rough at first but you'll leave a different person, a better, kinder person, and you'll be forever thankful to the people who helped you get there.  You'll stand on a stage with a bunch of lovely feminists and talk and yell and laugh about vaginas, of all things, and somewhere in there, you'll feel like a whole person instead of a broken one. 

It seems impossible to love yourself at this moment, I remember, but try, just a little, to get over yourself.  It is possible to give the love you have to others. Thank them and love them and eventually, you'll love yourself too. You'll be fine.  You'll be great. 

Trust me.