It feels right to put a content warning at the top of this post: it does delve into the whole subject of the #MeToo movement, though it doesn't discuss specific actions or people. Anyone who follows the news with even a sense of passing interest will be well aware of who the people involved are, and how the #MeToo movement roared into life last year. Still, I prefer not to put their names into anything I've written, because the legal cases involving them are ongoing and I don't want to place myself at risk (however far-fetched) of getting sued. Yes, I know it sounds strange to be saying that: as though I expect the famous people involved to come across my little old Steemit blog! 😂
Still, I felt the need to appease my strange attack of paranoia have my bases covered in that regard.
As with my previous posts, I am italicising everything that was written before November. Those pieces of text will be excluded from my total word count for the day.
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～ Sarah ～
Me too. For everyone else who has had to go through what I did.
I shouldn’t have to do this. I shouldn’t have to make a public declaration about what I’ve been through. But today, it felt important for me to stand in solidarity with everyone else sharing their story. It felt important for me to stand up and say: I am not ashamed. I will never be ashamed. And I will not be silenced any longer. #MeToo.
#MeToo. It wasn’t my fault. No matter how much my attacker tried to make me believe it was my fault, I know it wasn’t.
Me too.
… me too. This is the first time I’ve ever opened up about what happened.
October 17th, 2017. Though she has only just woken up, Sarah’s eyes are wide as she scrolls through her Facebook newsfeed. She has seen the headlines that propelled the hashtag into the spotlight, of course. Assault victims speaking out. Famous names being held to account. Talk of Hollywood’s entire power structure crumbling to the ground. She has seen the backlash too: accusations of a witch hunt taking place, ‘innocent until proven guilty’, ‘due process must be followed’, ‘false rape allegations are a reality’…
And now here she is, scrolling through all kinds of heart-wrenching accounts of sexual trauma from people she knows well, people she is vaguely acquainted with, and people she met once or twice through work, college or school … all of whom have chosen, en masse, to bare their souls today.
She puts her phone back on her desk, her mind racing. She can’t read any more.
✮ ✮ ✮
‘Hello, Mam.’
‘Sarah!’ Her mother, Lynnette, pulls her into a warm embrace. They have just met outside St. Stephen’s Green – Lynnette is eager to go shopping for a new dinner party outfit, and has invited Sarah along. It has never failed to amuse Sarah that she and her mother are so different: Lynnette is a very extroverted woman, who loves to go out, get her hair done and invest in new outfits whenever the occasion calls for it. Sarah generally dislikes shopping, but she is happy to join Lynnette on her expeditions from time to time, knowing how much their days out mean to her.
‘How are you, love?’ Her mother’s eyes – a vivid blue – crinkle up at the corners as she beams, links arms with her, and begins to stride across the road, towards Grafton Street. ’Is that a new coat?’
‘Yeah. I had to get a new one, with the weather getting so cold…’
‘Oh God, don’t even talk to me about it. The cold has me destroyed in the mornings. And could you believe that awful hurricane yesterday?’
‘Ophelia?’
‘That’s the one.’
Grafton Street is busy today: despite her general dislike of crowds, Sarah always enjoys the hustle and bustle of this corner of town. It's an anomaly she finds hard to explain.
'Quick trip to Bewley's?' Lynnette asks, her eyes gleaming.
Sarah laughs. 'Always.'
They continue to chat amiably as they gravitate in the direction of Bewley’s Café – over the years, it has become an unspoken rule for them to visit the historic coffee shop before they embark on the shopping part of their trips.
'Right,' Lynnette declares, once they have ordered their coffees at the counter. She takes a sip of her espresso and smacks her lips. 'Mm. This is lovely. Do you want to sit upstairs or down?'
'Downstairs is fine by me.'
'Grand. Down the back?'
'Sure.'
They settle into some comfortable chairs to the side of the restaurant, and Lynnette lets out a sigh of satisfaction. 'So! Tell me. How's life? How's André?'
'I'm good, thanks. Same old, same old, you know. Oh, and André's great. He got a new job managing the social media profiles for a pretty big company: you know, their Facebook, their Instagram, all that kind of thing.'
'God, isn't Facebook awash with annoying ads these days? I was on it earlier and I couldn't believe the amount of nonsense I had to wade through.'
‘You’ve been on Facebook today?’ Sarah asks, slightly surprised. Her mother has an account, but she very rarely uses it.
‘Oh yes. I went on because Madge texted me about some artists’ group she wanted to set up. Said she’d sent me an invite to the group and I had to accept it, on pain of death.’
Sarah smiles at this. She is well aware of how forthright her mother's friend can be. 'How is Madge these days?'
'Oh, she's good. As busy as ever: arranging this, that and the other thing! She was talking about setting up some group for – oh God, what did she call it again? NoNoMaRo? I don't know. I don't think it was that. Something to do with writing an entire novel during the month of November, anyway. She's mad. I said to her, "Madge, if you think I'm chaining myself to a computer all month, you have another think coming"!'
'What did she say to that?'
'Oh, the usual,' Lynnette says with a wave of her hand. 'Accused me of chickening out, not being dedicated enough to the artistic process ... all that kind of thing. Ah, she was messing, though. You know what she's like!'
'Right, right...'
They sip their coffee for a few moments. Sarah hesitates for a moment before murmuring, ‘so ... if you were on Facebook ... have you seen…’
‘The Me Too thing?’
‘Yeah.’
‘I’ve seen it, alright,’ Lynnette says, her voice brisk. She takes a sip of her coffee and falls silent for a few moments. They sit and listen to the chatter of other people in the café – their laughter, their gossip, their sharing of news – before she begins to speak again. ‘I’m surprised so many people are talking about this issue, all of a sudden – hasn't it been going on since time began? – but it’s good that it has finally happened, I suppose.’
‘I guess…’
Lynnette stirs her coffee for a moment, frowning slightly, then gazes intently at Sarah. ‘Sarah. Has anything like that ever happened to you, love?’
Oh God. Sarah clears her throat – she'll have to choose her words carefully. ‘Men haven’t done anything to me, physically, aside from the usual stuff, I guess – shouting at me in the street from time to time, or sending … um, sending messages I don’t want –’
‘Dick pics?’ her mother asks, unfazed.
Sarah’s face flushes scarlet. ‘Yeah.’
‘Hmph. I hear that sort of thing is always happening nowadays. I'm so sorry you've had to put up with that nonsense, love.’
Sarah nods, staring into her coffee.
'Sarah … if something did happen, you would tell me, wouldn’t you? I know I wasn’t always around when you were younger, I didn’t guide you as well as I could have…’
‘Mam, don’t beat yourself up. Please. I know you did everything you could.’
Sarah knows that she did answer her mother as honestly as she could – she has never physically been assaulted by a man, or had one of them push something on her that she did not want, even though the threat of it hangs over her head all the time. She would never dream of leaving a nightclub or bar unaccompanied. She crosses the street to avoid large groups of lads. She walks with her keys clenched between her knuckles whenever she feels vulnerable.
She doesn’t feel able to tell her mother about the incident with Sheola. To this day, she remains embarrassed by it, though she doesn’t know why. Because Sheola was a woman? Because it was just a kiss, and she ought to be ‘grateful’ that it didn’t go any further than that? If Sheola had been a man, would she be more inclined to open up about it? She just doesn’t know.
‘I hope this Me Too thing doesn’t just go away,’ Lynnette goes on. ‘All these producers and movie stars and whoever else they are could be back working in a few months, when the furore dies down.’
‘I really hope not.’
‘Time will tell. And did you hear there’s talk of holding a referendum on the Eighth Amendment at some stage next year?’
‘Yeah. I wonder will it pass…’
‘Oh, if this referendum actually happens, the result will be very tight, I’d say.’ [Side note: as it turned out, it really wasn't]
Sarah nods. The Eighth Amendment of the Irish Constitution, banning abortion in almost all circumstances, has always been an unspoken but tangible force in her life. The fear of pregnancy hung over her in a particularly intense way during adolescence, when the sole message they had received during sex education in school was, essentially, ‘don’t get pregnant’, with – as André often points out – no discussion whatsoever about LGBT issues.
Don’t get pregnant, don’t get pregnant, don’t get pregnant … this message had constantly been drummed into her head. When she had passed sixteen – the age at which her mother had become pregnant – without experiencing a pregnancy herself, she had had a sense of Lynnette breathing a sigh of relief … as though the curse had been broken, melodramatic as that sounds. Sarah knows that her mother loves her and doesn’t regret having her, but she remembers that her childhood was marked by a great deal of struggle. Things would have been easier if her mother had been older: more stable and secure in her life.
Have I always avoided having sex because of that history?
Sarah impatiently brushes the thought aside. She feels bad enough for not being open with her mother about the incident with Sheola – she doesn't want to lay the blame for her total lack of a sex life at her door as well!
‘Mam?’
‘Yes?’
‘I, um … I’m seeing someone. Well. Kind of.’
Lynnette beams. ‘Oh, really?’
‘Yeah, his name is Mark. I met him through a guy André is dating at the moment. They were in college together. It’s not a big deal, really. We’ve just met up a few times. Still, I just … I wanted to tell you.’
Lynnette reaches out and gently squeezes her hand. ‘I appreciate that, love. And I hope things go well with Mark. Is he a good lad?’
‘Yes.’
‘He’s treated you well so far?’
‘He has.’
‘I’m glad to hear it. You deserve nothing less!’
‘Thanks, Mam.’
Lynnette sits back and, with a satisfied sigh, drains her cup. ‘There’s nothing quite like a good espresso. So. This referendum thing … if it happens, you should make a film about it.’
‘Me?’
‘Is it really such a ridiculous idea, love? You used to be mad keen on filmmaking. You left college with all kinds of dreams … what happened to them?’
Sarah shrugs uncomfortably. ’I’m just … focused on saving money right now, I guess. There's no money in making films!’
‘Of course. I understand that.' Lynnette reaches out to squeeze her hand. 'But promise me you won’t forget about your dreams, okay, love? Go back to them at some stage.’
‘I’ll try.’
‘Good,’ Lynnette says, then winks. ‘As an annoying mother, that’s all I ask. Now … if you’re finished with that coffee, let’s hit the shops. Somewhere out there is a fabulous dress with my name on it. I can already hear it calling me!’
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I'm not going to count up my words just yet because I still have a bit more writing that I want to do before midnight. My tally for day four will be given when that is done!
I want to end this post by giving a shout out to everyone else who has signed up to the fit of absolute lunacy invigorating creative challenge that is #FreewriteMadness. 😇 Make sure you go and support their work too! I have limited voting power (damn my not-quite-plankton but not-quite-redfish status 😉), but will upvote as many posts as I can per day.
