My Readings: The Second Sex

"Why is woman the Other?"

This book has been a constant attraction to me for years now. I wanted to much to read it but was always scared away by its volume and density. I started it more than once but never proceeded beyond the introduction. This time I meant to finish it and I am working on it. It's august 2016. And let's see when will I end it.

The amount of biological knowledge in the first part of Book One is astounding. It should have taken a really huge effort from Simone to get through all this information and form them into a train of thoughts that is really enlightening. She took me through the eternal male-female relation in all living organisms from one-celled organisms to the fully evolved adult human beings, walking past insects, animals, fish, primates, mammals. It was an adventure so enlightening and revealing.

"The two gametes at once transcend and perpetuate themselves when they unite; but in its structure the egg anticipates future needs, it is so constituted as to nourish the life that will wake within it. The sperm, on the contrary, is in no way equipped to provide for the development of the embryo it awakens. On the other hand, the egg cannot provide the change of environment that will stimulate a new outburst of life, whereas the sperm can and does travel. Without the foresight of the egg, the sperm's arrival would be in vain; but without the initiative of the latter, the egg would not fulfil its living potentialities.
We may conclude, then, that the two gametes play a fundamentally identical role; together they create a living being in which both of them are at once lost and transcended. But in the secondary and superficial phenomena upon which fertilisation depends, it is the male element which provides the stimuli needed for evoking new life and it is the female element that enables this new life to be lodged in a stable organism."

This previous extract, from "The Data of Biology" In Book 1, is the beautifully described reproduction process in human beings which shows no dominance of man on woman but a cooperation and harmonious partnership. The female is always enslaved by the species and mostly this is reflected in limitations of her various powers. A woman also suffers from an alienation from her body during the different stages of her life while a man is always one with his body.  However, Simone de Beavoir noted that biology and anatomy alone cannot account for an answer to the question posed by the book.

Next she take us in tour through psychoanalysis. Her main criticism to it is that Freud based his interpretation  always  starting off from the male libido, the male , the sovereignty of the father which he is ignorant as to where the origins of male supremacy.

"To be a woman would mean to be the object, the Other - and the Other nevertheless remains subject in the midst of her resignation. "

More coming soon..........................

In September 2016,

Next, the book digs into the history of humanity, the history of woman in the Human story. The woman moved from a weaker but equal companion into the Mother, the Earth, the sacred Woman and then at some point she turned into man's private property, the insignificant Other. The fear of woman, she carries the truth of life in her, birth and death, she reminds man of his mortality, his limit, his weakness.

These two parts of the book is really intriguing. The myth, the fear and the hope of man in woman. She was feared, degraded, slavered, exploited, but never made equal. Of course, writing this book in the 40's the environment and society and norm was different. I wonder what Simone would think of woman of our age. Woman of this age has gone a long way and gained the liberty and the respect of an equal human to some extent. This extend change from one part of the globe to another. Because till today in some societies women is still looked down as incapable, as the weaker, lesser intelligent of the two sexes. Her biological function still lays as a burden on her shoulder. It seems as if it is her mistake, her problem that she was chosen by nature to be different, to take part in the eternal process of life. But man still takes this as her weakness. I think, this may be due to his fear of that role she plays. I think when man lack courage, lack confidence, lack the guts to face difference, he plays the role of superior and project his inferiority on the other, the woman.

In most of the Arab societies, a woman is still to some extent objectified. An eastern arabic man still sees her as object of desire, a sex tool made just for his satisfaction and his name's continuation.

I think there is a balance, an equality that is so unique. A man and woman can have a balanced and nurturing relationship. But such a balance needed confidence, courage and love.

More coming soon ...........................................................

My Readings: The woman destroyed

Story 1: The age of discretion

A story about growing old, about realizing that you have grown old. The heroine is faced with her age, her life is changing. She is retired, her only son has left her home and turned into a man she is disappointed in. Her husband has grown old too. There will no more be any excitment, any adventure, any new discoveries. Even her body is failing her, because she is no more young.

In her disappointment with her only son, she reminded me of another of Simone's heroines, Anne Dubreuilh in the The Mandarins. It was a great book to read. Both heroines had a disappointment in their children. Both didn't know how to communicate their love, only seeked to control and was disappointed when the mold of their child turned out into another shape, a shape too mediocre for their taste.

This short story is gloomy and sad to read but true. We feel the same but time pass and we are no more the same. It is about growing old, which is my own nightmare. I look to the horizon, every day thinking how will it be when I don't have so much still to achieve. How can take the day as good as it gets. Can I live through this peacefully. At 35, I am afraid of 65. But I think this will help me figure out how to deal with 65. 

If I live to 65, I am preparing for that from now. I want to live a life and enjoy its end. I am not letting myself grow into an old grumbling lady. I will find a peaceful way.

Story II: The monologue

I could really read it thoroughly. I was so distressed trying to get through its pages. It felt like being yelled at. I felt that that woman was shouting at me, fighting with me. No, indeed I felt I was in the mind of a crazy woman who feels she had always been victimized in her life and she feels hopelessly abandoned. I ran through the words, skipped paragraphs and pages just yo reach the end and feel a closure to this fight of a story.

Story III: The woman destroyed

This is a masterpiece. A painful painting of a woman destroyed by fatal love. In my opinion, Simone drew out a picture of all her fears in this short story. She never married the man she loved, because she was afraid she will be destroyed by that marriage. She wanted to keep her independence and keep him free too. She was afraid she will lose him if she captivated him into a marriage. A strange unnatural notion but it worked for them well but won't work for all. 

Monique, in The woman destroyed, lived  an assumed happy life. She believed she was happily married to a man who loved her for twenty years and still does. She believes she is a good mother with happy daughters. She sees the future at forty-five as harmonious and peaceful as can be. Suddenly, everything change. Her life is shattered inside out. Like a crumbling autumn leaf under her feet, her history and future crumpled and shattered into million pieces at her feet. It is painful to hear, see and feel her pain. She mistrusts her judgement and intelligence. She loses all self-confidence. Why all that? Because, she did what Simone is so afraid of, she gave herself totally into that marriage. She took her husband, her marriage, her daughters for granted. She overlooked small details and even her memory of things we are not sure of now after an incident that questioned them.

Maybe Monique was wrong, but the other way around is not the solution too. Maybe there can be marriages that survive forty and fifty years and keep intact. I think this needs to keep up the work and development, to keep questioning and curious about each other. Taking a marriage for granted is the worst thing, because you slip into a make belief. You no more want to see the truth but only the image that most make you comfortable and happy.


That's what jWoman has to say for today.

My Readings: D. H. Lawrence controversial novel in its different versions

Years ago, I read Lady Chatterlwy's lover. I was much younger and a different person, entirely. That book was the third and final edition of the most controversial book ever written by Lawrence. The book was banned from England. Now I am starting to read the second edition of this book, John Thomas and Lady Jane. This book has three versions that give a unique opportunity to study the creative process of the writer and the development of his book idea.

In chapter one, Constance got back to Wragby with her crippled husband Clifford. As years passed by in their isolated home, with their lives falling apart, she became stiff inside and the monotony of life was driving her insane. 

"She would live virgin by disuse. To this also she set her mind and her will. And she almost exulted in it. Almost in cruelty against herself, with smooth rigour she repressed herself and exulted in her barrenness."

Chapter two, her father comes to visit and he tried to get her to go with him on a vacation away from her depressing house. "Your feelings are going paralyses - not only your legs! Instead of living the life of a young healthy woman, you're going paralysed."

Before he left, he talked to Clifford, who he hates. He reminded Clifford of the fact he seems to forget or pretends to forget that Constance was a woman, a healthy woman who he can't satisfy. She a woman with conjugal desires.

Chapter three, Clifford and Constance had a conversation that dissolved their marriage. Clifford didn't realise the effect of his words. Everything to him was so abstract but to her it was the permission to be free. In her mind, her marriage and her commitment to Clifford was making her die slowly but she could not decide to break it. She was under his spell, under his will. His words broke it, opened a door that she never thought about.

Chapter four, Connie meets Parkin again. She meets his mean little daughter and take her for a walk to her grandmother. She hates him, as he seems disrespectful to her. She goes back to his house another time and saw him naked to the waist as he was washing himself. He doesn't see her. This incident vibrated through her senses, waking up her dormant bodily desires. She remembers the beauty of a living body. Late at night, she explores her own body in the mirror. Trying to look for beauty.


Chapter five, the christmas party at Wragby is here. Men has sophisticated looking conversation about life and death and resurrection. To me this is just meaningless non-sense. Men always try to be important and superior by talking of the abstract that they know nothing about. Lady Eva had a late talk with Connie in her room. She encouraged her to get a lover, from the lower class. She was hinting that men of their class had no real depth of feelings. Their men never entered into a woman's inner life, never really gave her anything that stayed.

Chapter six, Connie's health was deteriorating. Her sister, Hilda, come to her help. They get Mrs. Bolton to  nurse Clifford and give Connie some relief of her daily duties. Clifford resents that, hates Connie for giving him up to a stranger. They still have their daily evening reading which Connie resented still. Clifford still say nonsense in an important tone. He needs to feel important and superior.

Chapter seven onwards

I seem not able to describe chapter by chapter but now as my reading gets closer to the end of the book I have been through it all, the whole Connie and Parkin affair. 

The strange start of it, that intimate unbelievable   moment when unthinkable things take place. Parkin taking it as good as it gets. Connie desiring it but still fighting against submission. She wants the man but don't want to see the man or acknowledge him. She thinks a lot about men, Parkin and Clifford. How alive one is while the other is so absurdly dead although he fains an intellectual brilliance but to me his intellect is as solid dead as his insides, as his legs.

Parkin and Connie experience intimacy they both never knew with their spouses. Then Connie leave to France with her sister. 

I sometimes get lost in all the thoughts of Connie about Cliffford and Parkin and other men. The thoughts to me are so not feminine. D. H. Lawrence lost me there. I feel her fight and actions but not her thoughts. He failed me when he added his male intellect thinking this can be female intellect. It makes me real wonder about the differences. I think I like more Simone de Beauvoir's female intellect as she brilliantly showed it in 'the mandarins'. 

Somewhere in the middle of the book I started to hate the book. I felt Connie was more of a man. I had this feeling that D H Lawrence failed in touching the essence of the female in Connie. But by the end of the book, I loved Connie again. 

The eternal female, the fire is there and is feared by those who can't appreciate, feared by coward. She can't be touched except by a real man made of fire like her.

The image drawn throughout the book of living man/woman who were dead inside, intellect that is just robotic with no essence or feeling. Man's blind ego that he can rule forever is really intriguing. 

The sensual deep roots that society and people ignore and sometime taboo is the essence of real men and woman. Only real ones can understand it.

I appreciated the class struggle that was drawn in the book and the fading England people were facing. The higher class had to face the modern society that was growing and soon the two classes will merge and life will change forever.

A nice read

That's what jwoman has to say for today 

A tale as old as time

"Where do I begin to tell the story of how great love can be. The sweet love story that is older than the sea, that sings the truth about the love he brings to me. Where do I start." , Carl Sigman, 1970

"Tale as old as time, true as it can be. Barely even friends then somebody bends unexpectedly. Just a little change, small to say the least. Both a little scared, neither one prepared ............",  Howard Ashman , 1991.

That strange fire between a man and a woman has been the bewilderment and enchantment of men from all races, religions and ethnics since the start of time. The oldest tale in our cultures is about a man and a woman. Love is the origin of our existence.

An old greek myth, says that man was first made with 2 heads, 4 hands and 4 legs and one big heart. But as he angered the ancient greek gods, he was punished by being split into two human beings, a man and a woman. And it was said that from that day on, each man and each woman born will be in search of his or her lost half. The myth says that man/woman will never know peace till he finds that lost half. And it is when they meet, that the man and the woman will let nothing take them apart again.

"How do I know that I have found my soulmate?", a question disturbing many men and women. Whereas indeed it is so much easier. You don't need a handbook or a checklist with items to fulfil to make sure it is your soulmate or missing half.

No, not at all. When it happens, you will just know.

It is not the quickened heart beat, or the blush. It is not the need to stay near, even if in the shadow of their  dog, as the song goes. No, not just that.

It is not the sexual attraction or the need to touch and kiss or even to make love.

Love is just something else.

It is the peaceful trance that you fall in when together.

It's the wordless understanding. Strange as it may sound, but you will instantaneously, without really studying or getting used to it, understand fully the facial expressions. You'll have this feeling of knowing each other for a life time, ever since you could remember and maybe way beyond that.

Time and space are no barrier anymore. It still gives tremendous pain to be apart but you carry the essence of your significant other in your soul all the way.

It is ecstasy not for your body alone, no. Yes, your bodies bonds on their own with no effort from either of you.  Pleasure just happens, because you instinctively know how to please. It is sheer joy to your soul and mind. Love is when your restless soul finally find a home, a place to rest. And your mind find the respect and appreciation that he needs to pretend no more, or exert an effort anymore to impress. You will be accepted with all your flaws and loved for them.

Love is when you find your place finally in this world.

It's a real pity that some people live and die without experiencing it. Some may settle for something less just because they are afraid of the risk.

Anyway, when you find it, NEVER LET IT GO, whatever the price you'll need to pay.

This was written 29th November 2014

Love and Choice : Where lies our limits?

Love and Choice

We fall in love without choosing to.

However, what takes place after that is our choice, our own choice. These choices are what make up our image. That image is what people create for us in their minds. They judge us and categorize us into good or bad people using this image.

Why do we give a damn??! Simple because we don't live as individuals in reality.

No, we live collectively in a society that dictates our code of ethics, and what's good and what's bad. So we care about how people perceive our choices.

It is a painful process to be on good terms with your social image and keep it that way. This process sometimes causes us to lose our passion for life. We waste all our time doing 'what is right to do'. What about what we want to do, what we enjoy doing, what really makes us happy doing, what we love.

So after we fall in love, we face this dilemma. At the moment that we start getting back to life, after being swept off our feet, we start asking ourselves "What will people say about my love, will my friends accept him, will my parents love her, will......, will..........".  A lot of questions, depending on our status in life and the strength of our relationships with people around us and their effect in our life.

It also depends on our need for reassurance and acceptance. Some of us really need that to keep going, to continue doing their everyday business.

Limited by the code dictated by out societies, eastern or western, love fights to find a way to be accepted, just to survive. What if, our version of real love opposes these codes?

Do we give in, and give up our love, the origin of our existence to lead a lifeless existence ?

or

Do we give up our roots and the codes that keep our equilibrium and make us all similar, (where as we are never similar), to pursue happiness?

When is pursuing our own individual happiness, selfish and immoral?

When is loving truly, deeply, madly, an unethical thing?

When is giving up your love, the right thing to do?

I have no answers.

But I hope I can find them one day.

If anyone has an answer, don't hesitate and share it.

This is what jWoman had in her drafts for over year.

The Rainbow

A few days ago, as I was walking to work early in the morning, I saw a colorful rainbow across the just un-clouding sky. It has been raining all night and the whole week had  grey, cloudy mornings. However, that morning was different.  The sun was finally showing from between the vapourizing clouds. And across the sky, a beautiful rainbow was painted.

It made me think, rainbows are delightful and a symbol of hope and to me, it reminded me of my faith. It is not always there, but I have to remember that it is there. I try to keep remembering that one day these clouds will vanish and for a brief instant I will see what really matters, the only real meaning of things. Those moments are rare to capture, just like a rainbow but I need to remember that it is there.

At some moments, I lose my faith in love, in humanity and most sorrowfully in God. Life can get so dark that I don't see the end of the tunnel. The darkest part of night is just before dawn but sometimes I fail to wait anymore. I feel so tired and forget that there are rainbows. I forget about what's important. All I remember is the frustration, the impatience I feel.  

That rainbow made my day, made me remember what was important.


This is what jWoman had to say for today.

P.S. There is a novel by D.H. Lawrence called The Rainbow. I think I will reread it when I finish my current book.

On pain and life

Pain is a very personal experience. I think, it is one of the hardest experience to really share. It's not just physiological pain, but there is also and most importantly, psycological pain. Pain that can't be visualized to the outside world is an even more difficult experience to share.

Pain distorts our characteristics, it dominates our actions and reactions. The more we deny it's presence, the more it dominates us.

Pain, in some of us, is a drive to cause others to suffer from pain. We are so hurting inside and can't express it nor can we really acknowledge it's presence. Thus, we feel compelled to make others suffer. "Why do I suffer alone?" is the dark thought buried so deep inside our subconscious. We never confess we are nursing such a thought, but we do secretly, against our own will.

We all have multiple faces that we show to the world. I believe they are all partially true. A face we show to strangers, a face for acquaintances or colleagues, a face for friends, a face for family and a face for real close loved ones. Some of us may have more or less of these faces. They project what we want to show to the different categories of people. Pain and hurt distorts these faces, distorts our peace of mind and our judgement. We draw a smile and wear the mask that we want people to see but pain drives us to act in an opposing manner. Some people just need to see others hurt, just because they are hurt.


This is what jWoman wants to say, an old note that was left a draft for so long.

Miscellaneous Thoughts

I still discover myself with every passing day. I thought I have known everything but still I have more to discover. It's a fascinating journey into the human depth, especially if it's your own depth you are discovering. Pain is an accompanying factor to discovery. But pain is not always suffering, there is some kinds of pain that do not hurt but change. Pain teach you how to be stronger, if you are alert enough to observe and perceive that.

In this journey, I had to go far and do all the things I feared most and in the end, I discovered, "It isn't as scary as I thought". I was always afraid of living alone, especially since this implied that I will die alone. Now, I don't care. I am not afraid of living alone, I faced it and came into terms with my loneliness. Sometimes, I can even make it a chosen state of aloneness not loneliness.

As for the dying alone thing, this is the part I don't care for. For a start, worrying about that won't make a difference. Second, even if it did happen, it is not bad since I will die anyway. Third, I have made my adjustments to loneliness. It is not scary anymore. I faced it, looked it in the face and found I am ok with it.

I do feel lonely and sad at times but I perceive that and don't let it control myself but just get over it. The main part there is that it is not scary. I have successfully omitted fear from the equation.

I used to think that people are one of two types. People who conform to rules and traditions all the time and people who just broke all of them all the time. People who lived life just like traditions says and people who never does. I have known people and always tried to categorize them into one of the 2 categories. But  as I walked to work the other day, I was thinking of where do I fit, and fit in neither. I am a conformist in many things, I have lived big parts of my life just according to traditions, rules and religion but I did had my rebellion spots, and they were real non-conformists.

As I walk everyday to work, mostly I would follow the paved road but occasionally and purposefully, I would just walk through the rough ground taking shortcuts. I did each purposefully but not with an intent to conform or rebel.

I do like to play according the rules most of the time, but at whims I like to break them and when circumstances ask for, I do what I need to do, like when I am late for a meeting.

A person, I used to know, had this funny idea that you have to be an extremist, that in-between is lame. That you can't have partial characteristics but I always loved fuzzy logic where you are a member of multiple groups. Your membership to each group is what characterises you and your decisions. And the value of this membership change with time and experience. Everything change as you grow older.

And I am a fuzzy person, I think a lot, act differently than the stereotype placed for my likes mostly, but do conform too.

That's a real different blog.

That's what jWoman have to say for today.

My life chapters

Chapter 1 Childhood between home and alienation

Living inside my mind, was the main characteristic of my childhood. I had stories going on inside my head. I made up the drama missing in my life, the adventure and soon the romance, too. Sometimes, I made up stories to cover the drama happening in my young life. I dreamt and dreamt my days away. 

When I got introduced to books at around 11 or 12 years of age, I found my salvation, my solitude. My first real book was David Copperfield and I drowned in his sadness and pain to forget my disappointments.


Chapter 2  First love illusion leading to marriage
Love in eastern societies is a big issue, we think about all the time, talk about privately but never discuss publicly. When discussed publicly, it is always awkward. Searching for love is an etyernal journey in everyone's life. We all look for someone with whom we feel comfortable, we feel like ourselves.

Chapter 3  A revolution 

25 January 2011, the start of a revolution in my homeland. The start of a journey of exploration and enlightenment. No, I think that preparation for this journey started really earlier in 2010.

Chapter 4  Rebels go far
August 2013 marked the start of this chapter. It was the change that I most needed. The change that made me see things from a new perspective. I got the chance to look from outside, from far away. It was time to explore new grounds, to grow up by leaving home. I know I have left my parents home a long while ago but still I was living within my comfort zone. I was still living among my familiar environment. I had to start getting away, and being partially independent. This step would lead to a further movement and a more independent approach in the very near future. I could have never imagined, not in my wildest dreams that this decision will be the start of a whole new life.
  

Chapter 5 The new land

Welcome to the new land!!!

21 February 2016 , I set my feet on this new land and there I started a new chapter of life. I am hopeful because starting over and getting second chances is an opportunity not all people get. Here, I' m granted this chance to start over and be what I want to be. So I'm really grateful. 
It's a choice I made sometime ago. I choose aloneness. Aloness is getting sever with every step I take.

Farewells

I have said my farewell to the city of love. And at that instance I wrote the end of a chapter of my life, signalling the end of an era. Now, I m in transit waiting the start of what is to come.

The nice quiet city where I have discovered myself and a definition of love that suits me. I had the time and space there to contemplate and learn. In this city, there was no reason to rush and so much time to engage with yourself. I have loved the silence there. And I have rediscovered friendship and pure love. 

As I contemplate the last three years, it looks amazing and really fulfilling. I have gone through depths of life inside of me I never trodden into before. I feel amazed at the discoveries I made. 

The strength I discovered in me is amazing. I have learned to appreciate my aloneness. I m no more afraid of being on my own. Before, afraid of being alone was the main reason for my staying where I was. I made sacrifices that was unnecessary just because I was sure that I can't live and be on my own. I was attaching my existence and security to people, places and things. This is a big mistake which wasted 7 years of my life.

Now, I see life and myself so much better and I m ready to take things one more step further. I have hope and confidence. 

Life is full of surprises and experiences with good and bad included. And I have learnt not to regret. I have learnt to grow stronger from the bad and enjoy the good and in both keep smiling because everything will pass.

This is what jWoman had to say two weeks ago.