I have not ceased blogging. See? I’m doing it right now. I have another speaking gig coming up. Just like last time, as soon as I committed to a date to speak all creative juice got diverted to my speech. But I’ve got the bulk of the speech outlined now. I have the rest of the month to refine it. So I’m back here in blog format. Because I still love it so much.

Other than working on my speech I’ve been reading Girls of Glass. I’ve been watching baseball (it’s back too!) and Tales By Light on Netflix. I’ve been following The Body Is Not An Apology and Flying Edna online.

While I was away I gave up hair removal again; this time for good. No more shaving legs. No more shaving armpits or pubes. No plucking eyebrows or any other kind of facial hair. I’ve gone native again. Au naturel. I’m done with presenting my skin as hairless. Done with pretending. It’s not. I’m not. Women have hair. Everywhere. Since forever. I’m tired of demonizing body hair on adult feminine bodies, especially my own.

Hair on our bodies is normal and natural until we hit the magical age when it isn’t. We ignore body hair on children until they become women. Somewhere around puberty the very same normal and natural hair is transformed into a scourge and must be removed. And it must be continuously removed. And women who stop or refuse (never started) are gross. Men are not. Children are not. Only women.

Imagine if we did this to pets for whom it is normal and natural to have fur. After a certain age we shave all or part of it off because once they reach a certain stage of life the very same fur is no longer acceptable. So we take it down to the skin. Or wax them. Or pluck them. Or burn it off with chemicals. Or destroy their follicles with lasers. On repeat for life. How reasonable or humane does this sound? And yet we do it to women. And women submit as if this is reasonable and humane. Well, I’m done. I’m finally showing my body some mercy. I guess this doesn’t count as what I’ve been doing though; this is what I haven’t been doing.

I’ve been eating Dal Green Curry and Breakfast Tacos. I’ve been practicing yoga online with Gaia. I’ve been running. I’ve been playing tennis. I signed up for tennis lessons. They start next month. Luckily all my running skirts already have stretchy pockets.

I’ve been taking a few photos. The textures of my woodpile caught my eye (top of the post). And my frozen backyard fountain below.

And the tiny air bubbles in this old piece of glass.

And the lighted tree I still use almost daily even though I bought it for Yule several years ago.

And Peaco, playing hide and seek with Ug, and singing in church.

While I was I spent almost $700 at the allergist trying to confirm a sensitivity to nightshade noms. We only have one allergist in Mercyburg. The cost of an allergy test is $681.00. To scratch my skin and rub vegetable juice on it, wait 15 minutes, look at my skin, and then wipe it off. Dab on a little cream and then bill me $681.00.

After three years of keeping a food diary (rash diary) I patiently explained 15 minutes is not enough time. It will take my skin 12 to 24 hours to react. I’ll be fine all through dinner but the next day I’ll break out in a rash. That rash will take a month to go away. My protests were dismissed. The three years of data I collected (while I suffered, mind you) were completely ignored. Just shut up and take off your shirt, please.

So of course after 15 minutes with no significant reaction I was declared wrong. Couldn’t possibly be an allergy. Not a sensitivity. Not a clue about your rash, ma’am. The allergist stated he could not diagnose me but then offered me a frightening list of possible diagnoses other doctors might give me. Biopsies. Organ failure. Grafting things. So I more or less paid $681.00 to get scary diseases and procedures thrown at me because I couldn’t induce hives while he watched. There’s gotta be a better way, y’all.

This is why people turn to alternative medicine. Naturopathy. Homeopathy. We’ve got none of that in Mercyburg. So it’s either keep doing what I’m doing or rack up travel expenses for treatments not covered by conventional health insurance anyway. Or I guess a third option would be to go back to school and become a Mercy-opath myself. I’d be the first one on my block. But I suppose my body hair would repel or repulse everyone on my block, so maybe I’ll just lay off the tomatoes and save the cash.

— Mercy