Safety Dance

I just came out of a room full of 6 women ages 20-50 ish for the first day of training for a reproductive justice media project. Most of these women grew up in Kentucky, and all of them have creative, exciting ideas, and interesting things to say about reproductive justice. How inspiring. I think I tend to get a little obsessed with the not getting pregnant and sex ed aspects of women's reproductive health, and don't think about things like what to do if you get pregnant, how to take care of your body so you can have a healthy baby, birthing options, and cultural and social barriers. I tend to get carried away trying to be a one-woman condom dispensing machine and prophet of the Nuva Ring, that I neglect the holistic approach.

Of course talking about all of this is difficult in places like WV, KY, and even parts of OH, where people are pretty religious, Planned Parenthood and abortion providers are difficult to find, and women don't feel like they have a lot of options as far as childbirth goes. But these folks are working on discussing these issues, and it's pretty inspiring.

Oh, but I've been having fun too. On Friday I made bourbon balls, went to the bar very briefly, and then had my roommate drive me home so I could read and go to sleep at 10:00 pm. My kind of night.

The next night was the Appalshop Christmas Ball at Summit City. I am always looking for ways to re-live my high school glory moments (these three moments were: prom #1, prom #2, and graduation), so of course I am into anything that involves dressing up and dancing. Only this time it was much better than prom because I didn't feel the need to look for (and get rejected multiple times by) potential dates. Long story short, I managed to pull off a semi-beehive, wore high heels for what was perhaps the longest amount of time in my life, danced like a champ, and stayed up until around 3:30 am, which I haven't done since the care-free, pre-mono days of summer. So so much better than my high school prom, because there was no rejection-related drama, and my parents weren't there to get upset when they found out that there were boys at the after party (would you all still be upset about this?).

I guess the moral of this story is that I think I'm finally over that mono junk, reading is fun AND fundamental, as dancing is fundamental to your mental health which is fundamental to your reproductive health. So drink some orange juice, take some vitamin D, ward off the SDD Winter Blues, make your hair real big and dance.