The Man at the Door

I saw him out of the corner of my eye as I set my purchases on the counter.

He was standing by the door, and when he notices me noticing, he smiles at me.

He was a good-looking guy. Nice build. Nice smile.

And I could feel him checking me out as I was checking out my groceries.

I'm sure he was a nice guy.

I'm sure his mama raised him right.

But my gut told me something was wrong.

So I chatted with the clerk. 

And I bagged my items -- really slowly.

But he was still standing there.

He wasn’t waiting for anyone else. Only for me.

I should have been flattered.

He was a nice-looking boy.

The kind that holds doors open for women

Not the kind that kicks cats when women aren’t looking.

But looks can be deceiving

I didn’t know him

And my gut told me something was wrong.

A million and one thoughts went through the head

Of the girl I had been taught to be, the feminist I knew I was,

And the person who was just minding her own business at the grocery store.

The me that was all of these and none of these and more

Kept waiting for the guy to move.

In a perfect world, I would know

All he wanted was a thank you and a smile

Some acknowledgement that one human being recognized another

And was grateful.

But in the world that I know

A smile is sometimes mistaken for an invitation

A smile can twist quickly into a sneer -- a show of power and contempt

Contempt for me, contempt for humanity

Contempt for my right to be

So I found my voice and I nearly yelled, “What are you doing?”

And waited for his answer.

I wanted everyone in the store to hear, to witness.

“I’m just holding the door for you,” he said.

His eyebrows raised in innocence. Smile fixed on his face.

Another day this could have been the start of a beautiful fairy tale.

But it was also one flipped switch from my death in a horror film.

“I do not need a man to hold the door for me,” I said.

“You need to move. You need to leave me alone,” I said to this stranger to me.

Did he call me a bitch under his breath?

Someone did.

It was not only a thousand voices inside my head

Telling me to get in the kitchen and make that nice man a sandwich.

Give him my number. Marry him.

I didn’t ask him to hold the door.

We didn’t meet by chance

Didn’t approach the door at the same time

He stood there. Like a stalker

And I don’t know him

Don’t want to

And here’s the thing

If I was rude, I missed the guy of a lifetime. That’s on me.

But if his motives were pure, someone else will notice

Because maybe nice guys finish last, but they do finish.

However, if my gut was right

And he was looking for payback

Or to follow me out to my car

To take away my agency

Or worse

Then this was a fairy tale

And I am my own hero

Slaying dragons with my hands full of groceries

And winning.

Written for performance at Gusa by Victoria March 9, 2017

2nd Thursday Nights Open Mic 7-9PM

Gusa by Victoria

252 W Philadelphia

York PA 17401

The Man at the Door was written in response to a man misappropriating a woman's text rant, turning it into a meme, and calling her a feminazi. I could have ignored the online mansplaining, but when a group of women didn't, and attacked the woman and her agency, I needed to re-frame the conversation. 

Visit Author Mother Dreamer Phyl Campbell on Facebook, this blog, or her website.

Tired of Low Teacher Pay

I could write for years about this one topic and never say the exact same thing twice, but at the same time, it's all the same. It's nothing personal -- except that it is profoundly personal.

I won't waste anyone's time. We all know what's at stake. It's very simple.

What we give teachers is what we give our students -- and when it isn't enough, we all suffer.

PAY TEACHERS MORE. This includes teachers, aides, subs, anyone who works with students needs the freedom to do just that.

REDUCE TEACHER WORKLOAD. So many teachers get burned out having to do too much for too many with not enough. So many teachers are also parents. They should be able to work part time for what is now considered full time pay. This would help in a lot of areas.

It's time we did more than gripe about Common Core and high-stakes testing. Pay teachers more, reduce their working hours and responsibilities, and respect the work they do, Let teachers figure out what they need. This is the path to change.

Phyl Campbell is Author, Mother, Dreamer. She writes and conducts workshops on a variety of topics: Education, Women/Feminism/Equality, Book Reviews, and Writing. Her books are available on Amazon. If you'd like to see her speak at an upcoming function, contact her via her website or Facebook page.

Women Wednesday: Amazing Women

Today's post is going to be short because I'm in over my head with my grammar book edits and I REALLY need to finish them. But March is Women's History Month, and so it's a bad time to skip Wednesday posts or Women Wednesdays.

First, I'm grateful for Geena Davis and the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media. Since I joined the Facebook page, I've seen so many affirming things about being a woman in this day and age. We still have a lot of work to do, but in working together, we can get it done.

Next, I'm grateful to literary agent Kristin Nelson (not my agent -- as an indie I've not queried her, but I'm happy to follow her posts on FB) for sharing this information about women in indie publishing. I'll sum up the article by saying that self-publishing women are breaking through all kinds of gender barriers in their success. I hope as I continue to put my work in the hands of readers, I can join that group of successful indie authors. I am a work in progress.

Speaking of works in progress, thanks to a great book by Jennifer Weiner (Good in Bed), I am making some changes to the Jane's character in #25 Reasons. I had already made her a character whose body changed after becoming a mother, but I'd pulled back from making her a larger woman, in part because I did not need more "evidence" I was writing a memoir. While the experiences in #25 Reasons are things I can relate to as one half of a married couple, I have worked diligently to write something MOST women could relate to. Jane's story is Jane's, not mine. But after a breakfast date with a friend and a couple of nights with Weiner's book, I realized just how rare it is for plus-sized women to BE protagonists -- even in chic-lit. If I want to see changes there, I have to be part of those changes. 

I want to say a HUGE THANK YOU to a local lady named Dawn DeShazo. Dawn went further than I did in finding research about the PARCC standardized test third graders and up are supposed to take this year, and helped a group of parents (including me) REFUSE to test our kids via PARCC and REFUSE to open all our children's school information to a third party's market research whims. Parents did not think we could refuse the test for our children. Many school admins across the country have used scare tactics and misleading information to make parents would back down from protecting our kids' well-being and privacy. Dawn didn't back down. She did the research to show parents COULD, especially in light of our legislature working to end the contract with the third party company, and SHOULD refuse PARCC testing. There's still a bunch of shady stuff going on in our legislature that negatively impacts our kids. As long as parents work together, we can support our teachers (largely a female group) and help our kids be more student and less guinea pig for FOR PROFIT corporations.

Finally, I am great friends with MANY wonderful unsung women heroes. A mom took time out of her busy day last week to help me pull articles from my blogs and organize them for my grammar book. (That link will take you to some of those articles and blog posts.) Several moms have been sounding boards for me these past few weeks. Others are just there when I need them -- we don't talk as often as we'd like, but we can pick up three months of happenings in two hour phone conversations and if one needed something urgently, the other would drop and run to save the day. Having people like that in my life is just good.

So much for keeping this short!! There is so much going on by women and for women that I think needs to be shared.





Phyl Campbell is Author, Mother, Dreamer. Right now, she's in over her head with two book projects whose (author-self-imposed) deadlines passed by. She waved, and only cried a little. But sometimes the Mother and Dreamer get in the way of the Author, and the Author has to catch up. Check out her author page on Amazon.

Women Wednesday: Geena Davis and the Upcoming NWA Film Festival

Arkansas has been receiving some incredibly bad (and sadly deserved) press of late as a result of patriarchs running our government backwards towards 1950. But on this Women Wednesday, I want to talk instead about the fabulous Geena Davis and her film festival that is coming to BENTONVILLE in early May.

Unbeknownst to me prior to the announcement, Davis has a long history of promoting and encouraging equality in film. Her institute and website, Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media, highlights statistics, factoids, and other relevant information to bring awareness to the lack of leading roles for women in film. And it showcases work she is doing to change those statistics.

Davis has played many characters that defy gender roles. In Cutthroat Island, she played a savvy pirate captain intent on finding the treasure that eluded her father -- the treasure her uncle killed her father and skinned the map on his head to find. In A League of Their Own, Geena Davis portrays a phenomenal pitcher who helps manager Tom Hanks prove that a woman's place is at home, first, second, and third. Currently on Grey's Anatomy, Davis plays a doctor with a brain tumor who reminds women that sexism is everywhere -- that women are continually discounted and having to fight that glass ceiling. I'm not going to say I approve of that character's every move -- in fact, when she first came on I blogged about hating her character (see here). But a part of me revels in the way that she takes what she gets and does not make excuses or apologize.

I don't think it's coincidence that Davis has sought out these roles that challenge gender stereotypes and turn them on their collective heads. And while I'm probably not rich or famous enough to make it to the film festival in the neighboring city to my hometown, I hope that Hollywood presence sheds a healthier light though the gray negativity that has been plaguing my state.

Women Wednesday -- Guest Blogger Charity Bradford and the Sensitive Subject of Rape

Charity Bradford, author of Fade Into Me; image is property of the author

Fellow NWA author Charity Bradford is guest-blogging for Women Wednesday today. Her book, Fade Into Me, is available on Amazon and touches on several HUMAN issues. I know everyone else is talking about Forty-nine Hues Plus One, but I'd rather talk about just about anything else. And supporting local authors feels like a great way to do that.

Why Doesn't Ryanne Report Her Sexual Abuse in Fade Into Me?

My newest novel (Fade Into Me, an Urban Fantasy Romance) was released on January 21^st and it touches on a sensitive subject. One we don't talk about, but many of us are afraid of.

Something happened to my character, and she thought it would be best to never speak about it. Many people will read her story and ask why wouldn’t she say something and get justice? Sadly, lots of women don’t report sexual abuse, just like Ryanne. Back in November, I found an online article that talks about Real Reasons Women Don’t Report Rape.  I’ve summed up the top three reasons for you.

1.     Even if you report a rape, you can never get back what was taken from you.

2.     Two out three rapes are not ‘violent’ events. They are by someone you know—co-workers, friends, dates, etc. It often becomes a ‘he said, she said’ kind of thing.

3.     Often, those types of rapes occur when a woman has put herself in a situation that is hard to get out of. Maybe they planned for a little flirting but the man doesn’t stop when she puts the brakes on. In cases like this, women often MISTAKENLY think they are to blame.

I wanted to share the story of one person that Ryanne is partly based on. When she was around 14 years old she lost her virginity to an older teen boy. She was hanging out with her older brother and some of his friends. She found herself in a room with one of those friends and they started making out. At one point she put a stop to things and left the room only to have her brother tell her she didn't have the right to lead a guy on like that. He then told her she had to go back in there and finish what she started. In my mind this was rape. Some would say, "Why didn't she just leave the house? She could have still said no." However, we are adults looking back at this situation. She was only 14 and not equipped with the skills to deal with this. And the truth is even adults would find this hard. She didn't want to, but she felt she didn't have a choice. Later she couldn't say anything because the guy became her boyfriend and they'd had sex many more times. Who would believe that she didn't want to if she did it again?

Ryanne’s story touches on several other things talked about in the article: Someone she knew raped her and someone she trusted knew about it. She felt like she had to protect the second guy and his future by keeping quiet. She thinks it was her fault because she agreed to hang out with them. It’s a lot of baggage to carry. It’s the kind of thing that affects the way you see love for the rest of your life. Ryanne’s lucky though. She finds a man who understands it wasn’t her fault. He’s impressed by her strength to carry on and knows she's worth every ounce of love he feels for her. He just has to convince her to stop running from her future. 

For me, Ryanne's story is about Ryanne taking her life back. She's let the hurt, guilt and fear control her life. This story is really about her accepting that the rape was not her fault. That she has the right to be happy and loved.  

Buy it in Print

Buy it for Kindle

Watch the Trailer

Read the first 2 chapters

Summary of Links for Charity Bradford:
The Magic Wakes

Stellar Cloud: A Collection of Short Stories

Fade Into Me 

Website-http://charitywrites.com

Twitter-@charitybradford
Facebook Page

Some other links and articles about reasons rape goes unreported are here, here, here, and here.

Knowing why women (and men, for that matter) DON'T report rape is important -- it's important to understand WHY rape goes unreported. But how do we change this? What can we do to help those who have been raped reclaim their lives -- their senses of self -- their empowerment?

A Failure of Epic Proportions

So, suffice to say I’ve been quiet the last two weeks. Really, since my birthday. But with winter break and NYE and going on vacation to Florida – then returning to 20 degree temps and getting sick – well, it was understandable that it would take me a little longer to get back into the rhythm of things.

And then I got a job. And at that job, I lasted 6 days.

What was the job?

I was working at the warehouse of my very favorite online used bookstore, which happens to be a stone’s throw from my house. The bosses were wonderful. The co-workers lacked the negative attitudes you see in a lot of office and temp positions. People went out of their way to be nice to me and help me figure out the ropes – maybe because they could see me struggling so much.

So what was the problem?

Well, maybe I never truly got over my illness from late December.

There were precarious stacks of books that fell as I was trying to reach JUST the ONE.

Splinters and broken fingernails are not a laughing matter to me.

There was a certain door that needed a new latch, because only door whisperers could open it, but that I needed to open several times a day.

There’s the nerdy girl who is more than aware that having a round shape is not the same as being in good shape, and moving an extra hundred plus pounds from one side of the warehouse to the other wore on me.

And there’s the night owl who wants to write and sell books for a living who was having a dickens of a time getting up and to work on time (I would go to bed early/on time, but kept waking up throughout the night thinking I needed to get up for work). And when I got home, I was dead. My body was dead. My brain was dead. Some of my comments to people misused their/there/they’re, for grammar’s sake! Anything I added to Works In Progress would be suspect.

There’s a part of me that still recoils from the last warehouse job I had, and just entering a warehouse is kind of hive-inspiring (I didn’t tell them that when they hired me, because BOOKS).

There was my husband trying to help out and play Mr. Mom when I came home exhausted – and the fact that my 40 hour week earned less than one of his 10 hour days.

So there were a lot of less-than-significant things. But Wednesday is hump day. Hump day is for camels. This camel’s back was broken. Time to move on.

"O My Camel -- You Did What?" -- Morguefile Photo

It’s a tough thing to acknowledge that you have a comfort zone. It’s equally tough to know when you’re reaching outside of it – and when you’re plunging into something altogether different from what you were expecting. But it’s good for me – my hubris was getting a bit out of whack, for example – to try new things, to see what I could learn, and to grow. Sometimes, I even need to admit defeat. That doesn’t mean I’m going to stop trying other new experiences. Who could succeed without at least a few epic failures? And who likes those people, anyway? I’d rather celebrate my bumps and bruises.

So as I lick my wounds over this “failure of epic proportions,” and get over the nastiness of whatever this bug is (because seriously – it needs to GO), I will be on the lookout for the next adventure or disaster. Whichever I find, I’ll be more than happy to share it with you.