After a YUGA Meeting and a Run

EDIT: No idea why the links are unclickable. Sorry.

I feel way alive right now. Most days I like to walk but when I push my body to the limit and go for a real run, I feel great. And who was to think I wouldn't get chased by any dogs? I think this might be my day.

Today was also a YUGA (http://www.planusa.org/content172382) meeting. This month, we plan to kick gender discrimination's ass (last month it was AIDS).

One of the big things we've been working on is this: http://www.planusa.org/becauseiamagirl/about.php. We held a whole discussion about what gender discrimination IS, WHY it happens, and to WHOM it happens ... because there are ideas people tend to have about men, of course, as well as women.

My own examples varied: I suggested women were expected to invest more in aesthetics, for one (going to Kohl's this winter, I found turtlenecks on sale in the men's department for nine dollars. They were a rich, warm, durable material. But they had tissue-paper-thin turtlenecks for the same price in the women's department). My second example pointed to men touching and making inappropriate comments about female figures and feeling it's perfectly okay. I brought this up because I, like many women, have faced this in my own home.

We also discussed that very important issue of women being drawn in by the media and needing to be a certain shape, and how numbers were extremely important in the modern world ... namely, the numbers on the scale!

On the subject of body image, here is something I wrote and submitted anonymously to Teen Ink magazine during the fall. At this point I don't mind others knowing I wrote it: http://teenink.com/poetry/all/article/132677/Shoulds/

And was a blog entry I wrote not so long ago on celebrating oneself, and why it is most difficult to do.

And now it's time to get back to my Sunday afternoon.