Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Biddy is a woman of some years: a GenX'er, Riot Grrrl, survivor, traveler, tattoo collector, senior pet owner, music lover, former public school embattled public school retiree and amatuer vegan chef. Biddy Sounds Off is a thinking woman's bildungsroman and pirate radio station some thirty years in the making: featuring episodic writings and eclectic musical selections.
Welcome to Biddy Sounds Off, a place for episodic writing and music I love. I'm Biddy. Initially, with this podcast, I'd hoped to share my writing about my life experience because it fills up inside of me and I need to vent it, like a boil perhaps or just a vent. Because the pressure is expressed and released and whatever that means of figurative bloodletting is for you, we all need to feel at peace within ourselves and the world around us. Finding that peace is an increasingly difficult task in our world now, such as it is, and as much as I have tried to escape our hateful world and begin anew here in Mexico, after leaving the US, which had begun to feel increasingly and full of hate in my experience.
Biddy:It saddens me to say that the division I feel amongst my fellow Americans is here in Mexico too. Globally, divisions are appearing like fissures within respectful discourse. As these fissures spread, they threaten all of us. Respectful discourse to my mind is inclusive and accepting of multiple voices. It does not diminish the lived experience of others and it does not denigrate diverse representatives.
Biddy:It serves to support global infrastructures so that our foundation isn't filled with sinkholes and landmines of hate and violence. But here, even here in my Mexican bubble, the profane hate speech of Fox News and the like has found me again. It is alive and well and rearing its angry, pus filled head in my own actual backyard. As a result, I will have to time my run ins with my elder Texan neighbor slash landlord a little better from now on. Otherwise, he will find any excuse to spew chapter, line, and verse from the biggest big mouths on right wing TV.
Biddy:An example, student loan forgiveness I interrupted him, of course, after all, student loan forgiveness is I interrupted him, of course. After all, student loan forgiveness is why I'm here, starting my new life again, after becoming enslaved to the institution of American commerce for the better part of my life. After paying steadily for 10 years and working in low income title 1 public schools as a condition for 14 years, my student loan ballooned. There was no hope for me ever paying it off. These were sizable payments I made each month, as in the amount of rent I'm paying for my casita now.
Biddy:The public schools I worked in were full of people experiencing the same crushing student debt. We were trapped without hope of repayment due to extremely unfair terms meted out by our lenders, government lenders, private lenders, a system of commerce designed to profit off our backs. And because my neighbor thinks someone once got a PhD in basket weaving, he shoots off his mouth. All that hot air vents without waiting for permission from the people at podcast.com or whatever the fuck for permission to share his life story by whispering into a microphone about learning to find and use his voice. I've listened my whole life to to ignorant rants such as these, featuring right wing buzz phrases, shouting down others who think they are getting away with it, whatever it is usually exists within their own ego scape, a twisted and magical place where old white cisgender men are the soul keepers of morality and wildly tangled nose hair.
Biddy:Strident voices, intent on brow beating and intimidating. Bullies being bullies, they want that reactivity. Stoicism comes in handy here but I also want to express my disgust. And when I interrupt him, the world keeps turning. So, when I offer my own thinking by contrast, not confrontation, the world doesn't end.
Biddy:When he uses his monster truck wheels to run over my contribution to the conversation, I end it politely and walk away. Nothing bad happened. In fact, something only slightly perceptible happened. But for me, this is a strong assertion of self, personal growth, progress. Emboldened this Biddy to express myself, assert my validity as a voter, a part of the community, the conversation.
Biddy:After speaking with him, I am reminded of how many more blowhards are spewing their ignorance. Why would my opinion be any less valid? It's the same way I felt emboldened to pick up my guitar on my own after supporting countless of my friends' DIY bands, some better than others. Why the fuck not me? To my mind, colleges, universities and the like should be free, simply because these skills can provide opportunities for people.
Biddy:Any advanced learning and training should be designed to set people up for success and not shackle them to the very system meant to provide it. The unifying message this go round with regard to the new rise of the Right is not only intolerance, but the hatred this time seems so small minded as to be concerned with hurting other people. It isn't enough to simply choose not to help others, They would actively seek to hurt others, to hurt those who they perceive as getting away with something. I didn't get away without paying my student loans. I paid for it in full and then some.
Biddy:I was not forgiven because I made irresponsible choices in student lending. I was excused from the crooked loan terms that would have me paying multiple student loans in interest over time and possibly for the rest of my life. Getting special treatment was the code used around anti queer and racist and misogynistic legislation in the 19 nineties. That hatred persists for those who exist outside of the White middle class upbringing and experience. That experience is a lie and serves to perpetuate the inequities of the wealth gap.
Biddy:Those who experience life outside of a limited purview are not getting away with something, by aiming to improve their own lives and the lives of their loved ones. Existing outside of someone else's lived experience does not make them or their lives worth less. Our existence is enough evidence that we are deserving of respect, dignity. By pitting us against one another, they chip away at our human rights. While wealth gaps continue to widen globally and across the US, this small minded ignorance is strident and the right fighters, people who fight to be recognized as right, superior.
Biddy:That is more important than any cause they would claim to hold at the moment. And they must be right at all costs. And the uncaring world must capitulate to their ego because their ego must triumph above whatever cause they memorized a catchy catchphrase to. These grand bullshit cognitive dissonant epic tales we tell ourselves with the kind of self importance that begs for humility, begs for a hard day's work, begs for a karmic retaliation. Because even though they live these consequences themselves, the right fighters I knew in the US are emboldened now in a way I've never before seen, not even on the Simpsons, mind you.
Biddy:Disappointing to learn this about my landlord and neighbor. It would have been nice to share the odd cup of tea, but he has already made it clear my opinions are less valuable than his own. And I won't align myself with the side of tearing things down, might makes right, where the loudest, stupidest rant becomes the voice of reason. This is incidentally why I never became a sugar baby either, truly. The only men I ever met between my 2 spectacularly failed marriages with the kind of money to pay off my 3 figure student loan debt, for example, were right wing minded, affiliated, contaminated, unprivileged in some ways, privileged like a motherfucker in others, and so the sharing of episodic writing screams of the brave artists, I hope to share with you continues.
Biddy:Now, with this song heavily featuring screaming, it's revolution by Barb Wire Dolls. My student loans were forgiven in 2022. I shared the news immediately with my dad who was beyond thrilled for me. He had earned an MFA, and when I asked him how much his tuition had cost, he said, ping, guess how much? Guess.
Biddy:I guessed 10,000. Psshh, ming. He scoffed again. 75 cents. We chuckled together.
Biddy:These guys now, he explained. These student loan guys are the mafia now. He immediately asked where I'd go, meaning, which country. He was dismayed when I returned from France back in 2000 and 7, expecting me to fall in love probably and stay forever, making art. I'd have liked that too, I but I wasn't free enough then.
Biddy:I told him I wasn't sure yet, but that I knew I wasn't going back to public school teaching. The profession had eroded and demoralized me over time. The amount of admin and higher ups in both hierarchy and salary were a collective strain on my day to day. I did more work to appease them and perform for them, that I had little left for my desperately needy students. Public school teachers are the scapegoats for a great many societal ills.
Biddy:Meanwhile, I had students in desperate need of parenting, secure housing, a steady meal, students with attachment disorders, antisocial skills and their own burgeoning hate with a capital h, fueling their chaotic and increasingly violent behaviors within the asylum of my typical public school classroom. So many of us are well trained professionals are martyred up and we offer our own backsides to the lash. Realizing that my own needs had never been part of that equation was hurtful, unless you count lip service, which I do not. Someone wise once said on Instagram, if your job calls you a rock star, it means you're underpaid and undervalued. The last principle I had was the kind of person who enjoyed public shaming, pettiness.
Biddy:She led by fear and intimidation, an ignorant bully more concerned with her own image than the vulnerable children in her care. I shared teacher stories with dad who listened compassionately. With my student loans forgiven, he applauded my decision to pursue a new track in life. Late that summer in 2022, after mom had died, I packed up her house and her belongings. Dad stopped by. As I was removing the last boxes from the house, with fat burritos in hand, peppers, potatoes, rice, salsa and avocado for me, from burritos Betty up the street. Dad was famous among his numerous friends for showing up at just the right time, with lunch to share. He loved to bring a guy a sandwich. Guess how much? He asked me.
Biddy:Guess. We don't have those Denver prices down here. It's $3. We ate. He sipped his soda until the cup was nearly dry and the sound of slurping bubbles echoed throughout the empty house.
Biddy:After a while, he looked at me, an uncharacteristically somber look on his face. We had always shared the same dark coloring. My mother and sister had been blonde and fair. Dad and I both had little dogs of our own, snoozing at our feet with only one eye closed. In case either one of us wanted to get generous with our burrito fixins.
Biddy:When he finally spoke, he said, well, you're free now, honey. The words carried a resonance that echoed throughout the empty house. I looked up at him, realizing what he meant. Not just the house, the student loan. I was free of her too.
Biddy:My mom. We both choked up and I went in for a hug. He was a great hugger. After mom passed, whatever spell she'd cast dissipated completely and we were suddenly attached at the hip again. When she went, I was with her at her bedside.
Biddy:I held her hand and kissed her soft face, stroked her hair and I hugged her tight. I did this knowing full well she'd have shooed me away in life, for getting this close. I murmured all the things I want someone to say to me when my time comes. There was a large window in front of us, in the hospital room, a grand view of the parking lot. The clouds had gathered and the sky looked bruised, swollen.
Biddy:When she died, the sky erupted. A violet storm so loud, I couldn't hear the nurses and doctors and machines. It was a rage, that storm, and the rain lashed the windows and the thunder, crap. The wind roared. It raged for over an hour.
Biddy:I know because once the doctors and the nurses retreated, once their usefulness had expired, they closed the door and left me alone with the body. It grew cold and I had trouble closing her eyes. I kept thinking someone would come back and help me get up and out of the room. I froze, predictably, just stayed there, sobbing and watching the rain. Finally, I realized no one was coming, and so I drew the sheet over her.
Biddy:That transition, going from person to a body, stuck in the middle of the arrangement. I'd brought the sunflower from stuck in the middle of the arrangement. I brought the sunflower from her garden, knowing she'd been looking forward to seeing it bloom. When a passing nurse commented kindly on the bouquet, mom snapped at her. My daughter brought me those.
Biddy:That ugly sunflower's from my garden. The nurse and I exchanged glances. At that time, in 2022, dad hadn't shared his cancer diagnosis with me yet. I don't know when he found out and have every reason to believe it was a while before he shared the news with me. But back then, he listened excitedly, as I told him of my plans to go to Mexico, first.
Biddy:That way you're only a 3 hour plane ride away, I explained. You just gotta get to the beach, beach, Yeah, I said. You got a swimsuit somewhere? Oh, yeah. Let me get my g string packed, he quipped, hitting that d like a mob boss, touching the pads of his middle finger and thumb together in over articulation, an accent he picked up from the movies, I guess.
Biddy:It was late. Dad was a night owl and I'm a morning lark. When it was time to get off the phone, we said we loved each other as usual, then sometimes, 'lak a noch.' The sweet phrase he taught me when I was his tiny child, each night he'd whisper it to me after turning off the lights while closing my bedroom door. L'akonoch to you, gentle listener. The last song today comes from a 2022 release by The Regrettes.
Biddy:The song is anxieties. If you'd like to get in touch, please email me at bittybiddybops@gmail.com. That's 2 biddies and bops with an s. And now, check out Biddy Bops on Instagram. I hope you'll be in touch.
Biddy:This has been Biddy Sounds Off. Thank you for listening.