Sticks and Stones I

“Language is the blood of the soul into which thoughts run and out of which they grow.”
Oliver Wendell Holmes
American Physician, Poet, Writer, Humorist and Professor at Harvard,
1809-1894

"Sticks and stones may break my bones,
but names / words will never hurt me."
English proverb

A subject came up on another blog yesterday, to which I responded; thinking about that subject kept me awake longer than I would have liked last night. Thank you again, Pen, for providing me with a forum in which to write about those things. The subject that I pondered was responding to telemarketers with sexual language intended to make them extremely uncomfortable, so they would hang up, so no one would call back. There was a certain distinct glee in the notion of using language and sexuality to make callers uncomfortable; given certain homophobic attitudes, it is I think fair to assume most of this language would be directed towards women, not men.

I argued for courtesy, brevity, and clarity in expressing offense. Some individuals supported that, either fully or partially; others disagreed with my position, at least one in a moderately offensive manner. I responded with more restraint than my first impulse, but with asperity. That restraint left a lot of unexpressed feelings, so voila, they are expressed here.

As a backdrop, I am researching the subject of sexual abuse and sexual harassment of women in the military, returning women veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan specifically, and the traditions and culture of the military. Since I have not served in the military, I had a very productive conversation with Pen, who served in the military for a number of years. He gave me insightful observations from his experience.

Have patience, I will reach my eventual point, long way round; in the end I think the point will be better made.

When I was a very small child, I was very blessed to have as a regular baby sitter, a man who was a dear family friend, and also our family dentist, although he was much more than 'just' a dentist or oral surgeon. When I was much older, I came across his impressive entry in Who's Who, and learned just how remarkable he really was. He was the first person to recognize that I was an unusually smart child. He lived in a beautiful Georgian house; his den / library had high ceilings, with built in bookcases full of books all the way up, an enormous antique desk, and a fire place with a beautiful original oil painting hanging over it. Best of all, this room had both a microscope AND a telescope in it; I was given every encouragement to explore ALL of it to my heart and mind's content. There were never any 'don't touch' restrictions, despite all of the objects throughout the house were extremely valuable. It was a house where adults lived, not children; their children were grown and away at college. I thought it was the closest thing there was to heaven on earth.

I remember being encouraged to take books off the shelf, even books from the very highest where I had to be lifted up, books that we would then go through together. It didn't matter what the subject was: poetry or literature, history, bacteriology or some other science, philosophy, anything and everything. We would read it together, and talk about it. By talk about it, I don't mean in the usual way that adults tend to talk 'down' to children, but more as equals, mentor teaching protege. I remember he said my questions challenged him; I remember that the way my mind worked often made him laugh, laugh out loud, laugh until he had tears in his eyes. I never, ever had the feeling that he was laughing AT me. I sensed he enjoyed watching me think, he approved, that he was a kindred mind and spirit; in many ways, he understood me more than anyone else in my childhood.

This wonderful man had a profound influence on the development of my intellect, and on the formation of my character. He taught me to dare to challenge limitations, especially artificially imposed limitations, including assumptions about restrictions by gender. I remember my early discussions about shyness, and fear. He taught me fear was sometimes a good thing, that it could keep you safe; but it also could be a bad thing, if it took over control by the rational mind. He taught me to evaluate risk for myself, that risks could be calculated and managed; that I should dare whatever I thought worth the effort, but never foolishly. I grew up hearing the message over and over that most people are uncomfortable around smart people; that boys and men especially didn't like smart women because they viewed them as threatening to their egos, even smart men, but never from him. I remember saying that people who didn't enjoy intelligent women were boring; I refused to pretend to be less smart. He was amused by my rebellion.

As my dentist, he was the first to recognize that redheads have different pain reactions, and have a different response to both local and other anesthetics, before it was better researched and documented. He measured my pain perception and tolerance / resistance with a type of dolorimeter that directs a puff of air towards the eye, when it was still a new science. When I needed dental work of any kind, we discussed together how much it might hurt, for how long, and what the options were for controlling pain including the pros and cons of medications. Control of pain decisions were given to me; with the empowerment of those discussions, I usually opted for minimal medications, or none. We discussed the importance of knowing how much and how long something would be painful, of mind over matter for that period. He was always accurate and candid with me, and with the other aspects of our relationship, built up a very deep trust. When he deemed it necessary to remove all four of my impacted wisdom teeth, I didn't hesitate, when he recommended Novocain instead of a general anesthetic because he felt it would be important for me to be able to move my head and hold my head in certain positions. He showed me the x rays and explained everything fully; he would have to work quickly because Novocaine wears off unusually fast for me. For that reason, he would do one side, top and bottom, one day, and the other side a couple of weeks later.

During the surgery, from the beginning, there were painful complications. It resulted in bleeding, requiring cautery. As I was tried to swallow the blood that wasn't sucked up by the tube on the side of my mouth, he asked his assistant get the cautery unit. It should have been in the surgical suite, but was in the other dental treatment room. When she came back, this unprofessional woman said, very loudly, "Oh, my GOD! Look at all that BLOOD." This was not good, but I didn't let her comment get to me. I made a face, as best I could given the circumstances, rolling my eyes.

My dentist was very critical of her conduct. Worse than her original mistake, she continued on about the blood. I was not only a patient, I was in the relationship of a protege, a word derived from the Latin protegere, to protect. My mentor lost his temper, in a way I had never seen from him, ever. He not only raised his voice, if not exactly yelling, he used words that shocked me. He made a vulgar, crass, derogatory reference to blood, specifically menstrual blood and this woman's experience. I have never had the involuntary response to blood that many people feel, both men and women. But there was something about the ugliness of what he said and how he said it and meant it that made me feel very suddenly sick inside, small, a naked kind of vulnerable, and helpless; that was the intent of those words, although not directed at me. It was the absolute opposite of the empowerment, the sense of control, including the mastery over pain, that I had built up.

As a teenager, I did not have the armor against words and attitudes that I have now, including skills dealing with sexually abusive language; nor the mastery over my emotions that I have tried to acquire with maturity. What I felt showed in my face; I certainly wasn't verbalizing anything, in the middle of oral surgery. He looked down at me, and stopped cold; he asked me if I was okay. Then he stepped into the hall where in my hearing, he apologized to his employee. When he came back into the oral surgical suite a few moments later, he gave my hand a squeeze, and talked me back to where I needed to be to finish that surgery. I had been shaken by his words, by the ugliness of the thoughts and the hostility, but my trust was stronger.

As a result of this experience, I gained an insight into the destructive power of thoughts and words, even the destructive power of sexuality. It gave me an empathy to the nature of pain and control that comes to mind on the topic of torture I would never have had without losing my control during a surgical procedure. From this, I think I understand what Judge Sotomayor was trying to say, albeit badly, when she spoke about her experiences as a woman and a minority resulting in a better understanding of others' experiences. I take it to mean not only understanding feelings generally, but things like separating truthful statements from untruthful ones made in court testimony.

This was certainly the formative experience that came to my mind when I commented on using sexually explicit language to make a telemarketer feel uncomfortable in annoyance. To me it seemed a drastic difference of degree, but not a great difference in kind, to the mind set that causes the unpleasant, damaging experiences of women in the military, and the failure of the military in many instances to adequately respond to them.

"Sticks and stones can break my bones, but names / words can never hurt me" was a rhyme we were all taught as children. It is not true. While physical violence is certainly a very different thing than words, words also can have a serious, significantly damaging impact on each of us. That is as true for men as it is for women.

As I wrote these words, believing I was in control of those feelings, I had an enlightening experience. I am taking care of a young dog, a two year old intact male, a beautiful borzoi, for a friend. I was one of the first people to hold him when he was whelped by C-section; I bottle fed him from that first day, comforted him if he got stepped on in the whelping box. We have a deep connection, a strong rapport, this dog and me. As I was sitting at the keyboard, tapping out the first paragraphs, rereading, editing, spellchecking, this dog was sprawled out in another room, oblivious. As I was working on the paragraph with the unpleasant memory, he suddenly came barreling out of that room over to me, laying his head on my arm. I petted him, talked to him, gave him a quick kiss on the 'sweet spot' between and slightly above his eyes...... and expected him to go away. That kind of intermittent touching base between canine pack members is routine, also with their humans. There was nothing unusual, except perhaps the timing.

But he didn't go away; he picked up a squeaky dog toy, a really annoying squeaky toy, and lay down behind my chair, in a defensive position. I am very attuned to dog body language, and to the significance of relative positions, between dogs, dogs and people, dogs and... things. It is an essential skill in retraining dogs, especially dogs where there are aggression problems. This dog doesn't have aggression issues, but he exhibits behavioral cues. Other dogs were not allowed to approach; although more subordinate in the pack order, he briefly assumed the dominant role of pack enforcer. I was home alone, but I doubt that he would willingly have allowed any person to approach me. My best educated guess, was that he sensed more than I had understood, hoe those memories were distressing. I cannot explain how he could pick up on that from another room, but I trust my instincts in reading dog behavior; they have stood me in good stead. It was not the first time I have observed dogs sense things in ways that are not easily explained, especially service dogs. This boy has excellent service dog potential; he is unusually perceptive.

I got up for more coffee, did other things, and the entire time, he was my shadow, a 'Velcro' dog; not his usual behavior. When I came back to the computer, to add this final paragraph, he resumed his protective position until I was near the end. Then he got up, nuzzled my hand, and returned to his original spot in the other room to lie down again. His job was done. Mercifully, he did not take the annoying squeaky toy with him. So now, I am apparently no longer emotionally vulnerable; I have resumed my role as human pack alpha.

Addendum

In writing Sticks and Stones, there were several things I wanted to accomplish. I leave it to the readers to decide how close I came. I wanted to write from a female perspective in a mostly male genre; I wanted men to see through the eyes of women. I wanted to write about the power of language.

The only way I could think of to use words skillfully enough was to use a real experience, an experience of my own. I followed the admonition to writers: write what you know. So, thank you Pen, for the compliment that I am brave, but I don't think I deserve it.

In writing about being female, and the destructive power of language and men, I wanted to write about the positive aspects. This is why I chose to write about my mentor. It was not my intention to 'bash' men, but to acknowledge those men throughout my life who through language, and through their qualities of character and intellect, each in their different ways created an environment where I could challenge and develop my abilities, my skills; where I could identify and pursue my interests. That includes as the most recent example, writing here.

I have never tolerated bullies. When I was a junior in high school, a male senior was bullying a younger student. I politely asked him to stop, twice. Unwisely, he did not. After the second request, I lost my temper in defense of that younger student, much as my mentor had lost his temper. I did not raise my voice, I did not use vulgar language. That was not my style; I was always 'ladylike', but I was vicious, I was fierce. I used language to wound, with precision, with calculation, as if it were a very sharp knife. Because the bully had not stopped when asked, I felt free to be punitive. The intention was to hurt him, to reduce him to tears, if not in front of me, as soon as he was alone. My high school boyfriend, who witnessed this, afterwards said to me very simply, that I went off on the bully "like an exploding grenade." He very gently made me realize that given my far greater ability to use words so effectively, I became a bully, however well intentioned I began.

I can laugh now, recognizing how strong and secure this guy was at the time, to be comfortable with someone with my.... 'force of personality'. I don't think I changed that bully by being nasty, however much I enjoyed my verbal advantage. But this young man accomplished that with me by being wise, and gentle. He taught me a lesson, which I regret to say I have had to relearn from time to time, that like physical violence which tends to beget more violence, the hostile use of words elicits more of the same emotion.

Over on SitD, another blog, when the topic of abusing telemarketers came up, my first impulse was to respond aggressively. There are a few individuals who lurk there who have over a span of years in other venues seen me 'verbally draw blood', and who are may be waiting to see me do it again. It was not difficult to resist that first impulse, but it reminded me of my mentor, and of that old high school boy friend. It reminded me that while we may do it differently, women make the same choices to be as nurturing and protective, or as destructive, as men.

I have learned more from dogs than I have ever taught them. Every interaction must begin with first understanding, and then controlling oneself before trying to understand and train or a control a dog. The exquisite hound who guarded my chair when I wrote Sticks and Stones is a sabled red dog, the red in his coat is very similar to my own coloring, like an outward symbol of our inner connection. He is an extraordinarily sweet creature, but he was bred for function as well as beauty; he has a strong prey drive, in his very core he exists for the joy of the chase, and the thrill of the kill. In his own way, he has reminded me how even the most lethal ferocity can exist side by side with tremendous gentleness and grace inside the same skin. Dogs are born understanding what we need to learn consciously. What we do verbally in our relationships, dogs do nonverbally.