Go eff yourself, smegman.

So I'm in the Chicago 'burbs now, crossing the street today, checking my blackberry, and some guy shouts out the window: "Do you think you REALLY have to be on your phone right now?"

I didn't catch what he said fast enough to give him the finger or shout back "Go eff yourself," like I normally do.

But then I thought about it.

Yes, I really have to be on my phone right now. I'm running a business. I'm reading an important email from my Managing Director. So I'm crossing the street more slowly than you'd like. I have the right of way. And yes, I really have to be on my phone right now.

And then it occurred to me: if I were a man, in a suit, checking my blackberry, strolling across the street, this man wouldn't have shouted at me because I might be Important.

Well.

I would like to think I am very Important. I am a 5'2" jeans-wearing woman and I am running a new theatre company. We're presenting exciting new works this summer.

So go eff yourself.

It occurred to me, also, as I was listening recently to the foul language that comes out of my mouth, that I use the word "pussy," and "cunt," "twat," and "chatch," to describe people. So do many. Even the ever-popular "douchebag" is describing the outpouring of remnants from a vagina into a plastic bottle. And we use vaginal excretions to describe people. They are the lowest form of a human being: a douchebag.

We are so used to these words we don't think about what they mean. But they have great significance.

Our language is so slanted to hate women and speak degradingly about our parts that of course we still hold anger and disrespect towards women, subconsciously, or outwardly, as this--there I go--douchebag--did today.

How about: a smegman. Or a dingleberried, pot-bellied, hairless-but-hairy-everywhere else egomaniac. (Can we put that in a word?)

Or how about the equal opportunity: "asshole." We all have those and no one's is pretty.

The next time you want to say "d-bag," or "pussy," choose another word. And please choose carefully.

Rhymes with Orange.

So some asswipe Traditional Rabbi said: "A woman belongs on the bimah (the altar where Jews pray) as much as an orange belongs on the Seder Plate."

For those of you that don't know, an orange doesn't belong on the seder plate--we have things like bones and eggs and greens and apples mushed with nuts and wine and horseradish. That's what's on a seder plate.

So this guy's point was that women shouldn't be rabbis. And the seder I was at tonight, like most of them I have been at in recent years, have oranges on their seder plates, in Defiance of This Horrible Man.

It's funny to me, that as a culture of educated people we make these symbolic changes and we do little to really Change.

But then I wonder if that's just our Nature.

The head of our seder tonight was a male. It's usally led by a male. I don't want to do it. I do and want to do a lot of things; this is not one of them. And then I realized almost ever seder I've been to in my life has been led by a male, that's just the way it is.

But with that, comes the comments that happened tonight as they do annually, the head of the seder commenting on his wife's poor cooking, as if she were supposed to be BORN able to cook. It's all in fun but tonight I heard it differently. She is the Food Organizer, as he calls her, and we all laugh.

This woman is an educated, working, successful woman. I know he's joking but there it is, this Symbolic Orange, and nothing around us is any different.

At this giant seder, we all go around and say our names and what we do. A young woman there tonight said she is at a major university studying to be a sports broadcaster. I found that bold and somewhat impressive. I always think the women sports journalists seem very savvy and enthusiastic and well, cooler than myself. On the way out, I heard her say, "yeah, well I don't really take women sports broadcasters seriously, so we'll see."

This is what she is studying to Be. If we don't believe in what we are, how can we grow up to Be it.

I just finished a two-month stint at an all-women's university, which was a most interesting and empowering experience. The women are smarter, savvier than I was at that age, more realistic, more emotionally resilient and more open-minded than I was in my early 20s. And they are learning to lead in ways I didn't. I would never have considered an all-women's school because I was supposed to Find a Husband in college. But I wonder, had I considered one, would I have been more likely to Find Myself sooner.

I fought for Hillary Clinton last year because I didn't know who our first woman president was going to be if not her. I still don't. Maybe it's just not in our nature to want to be President? Maybe we just don't want to deal with it the same way I don't want to bother to ever lead a seder? Because that's just The Way it Is?

When She wins, whomever She may be, I believe we will be a country changed forever, for the better, in the way I think we are after this election.

These women at this school are truly remarkable. Their yearbook is called "The Spinster,"--as it was deemed years ago--they cannot break with tradition.

I believe they will be the ones, however, to break with tradition--they are the female leaders of tomorrow and I am grateful to have worked with them.

So Angry I Could Blog

I have just come home from being assaulted by David Mamet's Speed the Plow, an unnecessary, irrelevant revival but for the fact that he presciently overuses the word "Maverick," and predicts the collapse of the economy.

This evening, this play felt like an excuse for misogynists to celebrate publicly and feel O.K. about it.

If you haven't seen it, and you don't need to, basically it's about a soulless movie producer who teams up with yet another soulless movie producer to pitch some movie that will make them rich. The movie is bad but that doesn't matter. In walks in a temporary secretary, seemingly dumb as nails, who ends up in first producer's home and talks him into believing in something.

The next day he finds out he has been duped because he realizes she met with him for personal gain, and that she is merely "pussy wrapped around ambition."

This might have been funny if I hadn't been treated as such so many times in my career.

And it occurred to me, while watching this play, that in this New Day with our New President, I am sick of the White Theatre. Because if this temp girl in Mamet's play had been an empowered black woman, she might not have taken any shit.

If there's one thing that is clear from the myriad of Inauguration Ceremonies, it is that our country is rife with excellent black artists and, given that so many gathered in D.C. on Tuesday, that they are very excited and ready to have their voice heard in the Mainstream.

And so am I.

Ready for it?

I believe Beyonce is the leader of the Feminist Movment.

Yes, really.

She has coined our country's most popular "if-then" phrase:

"IF you like it THEN you should have put a ring on it."

What could be more clear? There's no emoting, there's no hemming and hawing. There is only logic. A white chick would never have the wherewithal to be so bold.

A close second is: "Don't you EVER for a second get to thinking you're irreplaceable," and tied is:

"The house I live in, I bought it. The car I'm driving, I bought it. I depend on me."

So clear. So concise. No B.S. And no one says: "Aw man that Beyonce, what a bitch." She is REVERED for her outspokenness, and all of America is quoting her.

During the campaign people tried to shut Michelle Obama up. She is naturally outspoken and that was scary to us white folk. But now that she's there, I would encourage her, if she's reading this, which she's clearly not, to not let the White Folk make her a fashion plate and to make sure she is heard. Michelle Obama is a brilliant, articulate woman and it would be a shame if she is merely the next Jackie Onassis (who, by the way (referencing the last post) has a reservoir named after her. We also came up with Golda Meir Way, but she's not a U.S. leader, and I forgot about Campbell Brown's show on CNN. I digress.)

Amidst all the dramatic recent cast changes surrounding Speed the Plow, (which, frankly, are more interesting than the play itself) while we're at it, how about replacing the white chick with, Beyonce...?