1. How to Stop Being a Victim

Since I wrote an earlier article about dealing with narcissists, I thought I could expand further in this article by sharing some of my thoughts with you about an equally important piece of that puzzle: not being a victim.How are they related, you a

2. Left Out

I feel like a cop who's never off-duty.Last night was soccer pictures for my daughter's team.  I like these girls.  They all seem open, smiley, fun.My daughter has made a few friends.  She really likes one girl named Holly.  Holl

3. Brand New Jones

I've got a brand new jones and nobody even knows.It took some time but I had to admit it to myself.Before it was just a casual friendship, but it has blossomed into something more.

4. Right-Away Emotions

The act of giving birth is one of the most creative and demanding things a person can do. Sometimes endorphins that were released during the work of labor leave mothers with a feeling of exaltation -- a high that some women liken to a drug high. Feel

5. Let Passion Flow

Have you ever watched a musician perform?  I'm not talking about just listening, but really watching their body movements and facial expressions?  Once I saw a Santana concert on TV.  I've always loved their music, but on that evening

6. Confidence

Face it. Being a young woman has its trials and tribulations. In my specific scenario, I ended up being a seventeen-year old mom, uncertain of what her future would hold, afraid of what the world would utter behind her back. And still, as time passed

7. It's OK to Indulge

Indulgences come in many forms - cleaning services, massage therapists, hair colorists, gardeners, or even a quiet bath.  Ironically, the indulgence that women are always meant to feel horrible about is one that was not only permitted but encou

8. Guiding Teen Girls on The Rocky Road to Womanhood

In this article, I’d like to discuss a topic very dear to my heart - guiding teen girls into womanhood.  Why do I feel so passionate about this subject?  Well, I was one once many moons ago and I can’t believe I made it out alive and am no

9. Fun with Anatomy

When looking back over the history of female ejaculation, one thing that's glaringly obvious is that society has been (and sometimes still is) skeptical about its actual existence.  The major reason for this uncertainty is that, until recently,

10. Sarah No-Mates

I don't have many friends.  Honestly, not counting my husband and my university buddy who lives out on the West Coast - I have no friends.During my Waiting Years, as I like to call my time spent waiting on tables, I had many friends.  Ther

11. The Conspiracy of Silence

Recently, I received a phone call from my friend Janice, who was pregnant. Janice had suffered two miscarriages in the first trimester, and all of her friends were concerned about her ability to carry this baby to term. When I called her back, the f

12. What Would Grandpa Do?

My beloved Grandpa Hale passed on to another realm February 21, 2008.  I, and so very many others, are still reeling with the news that such a vivacious, energetic, and loving man is no longer with us in body.  All those who loved him, who

13. Becoming a Vagina Warrior

Vagina Honors This past February, I was named a Vagina Warrior."A Vagina Warrior? What's that?" you may ask. The term "warrior" may seem an odd one to associate with anti-violence work. Yet in feminist reclaiming of the word, it's

14. Show and Tell

My son had show and tell today.He was supposed to bring something he brought back from a trip anywhere: vacation, sleepover, a stop at the lakeshore.First, he suggested his Build A Bear.  He absolutely loves it.  Candy Cane, as he calls it

15. Mother of a Boy

Memoirs of a Modern Day Housewife Maggie. This was the name of the slender, petite girl that stood in front of me. She played a pretty melody on her clarinet using her soft, pale fifth-grade fingers. I gazed at her in disbelief. A sort of bewildermen

16. How To Deal With Narcissists

It seems that when dealing with difficult people, one of the most challenging types is someone who is narcissistic. Without getting all psychobabble on you and boringly academic, I would like to simplify things by generalizing.  While narcissis

17. Lipschtick

I wear lipstick.I think it started during my waitering days, when I'd wake up around 9:30 or 10:00 in the morning after a long shift the night before.  I looked horrible and I needed to go down to the corner shop for coffee and cream, and I cra

18. Think Positively

Have you ever wondered where the expression, "knock on wood" comes from?  There are several theories dating back to the Pagans, Christians, and ancient Celtics.  The most common is that knocking on a tree woke the good spirits wh

19. Desire as an Evolutionary Tool

Many traditions see desire of all kinds, but sexual desire in particular, as negative, as something that must be suppressed. Desire is certainly complex. It can overwhelm us and interfere with our better judgment. In this society, we are conditioned

20. Colorism

Walking into Treasure Island grocery store, as a woman of color, in Chicago’s predominantly white Lincoln Park neighborhood, I immediately made eye contact with the only other person of color there, the black female cashier, and gave her a smile tha

21. Girl

I waited on tables for a long time.  It’s a tough job.  Chances are I didn’t screw up your order, but I wasn’t happy about being there in the first place.  So as a skating judge might say - I was technically perfect but artistically, I

22. Memoirs of a Modern Day Housewife (Part 5)

“I am”I am a runner, obsessed with the endorphin rush achieved after a foot-pounding adventure.I am a writer, seduced into making every day, every dream, every feeling a story.I am a knowledge-seeker, whose realm of discovery lies in books, novels, c

23. Have an Open Heart, Because You're Worth It

I have something to say about my heart. And something, perhaps, to tell yours. This might have less to do with my experience as a feminist, and more to do with my experience as a human, but I often feel like feminism is mostly about having compassio

24. Feminine Intuition: Your Power To Know What's Really Going On

There was a time, back in days now lost in the fog of prehistory, when Woman didn't need oracles to predict her future or reveal what was going on behind her back. She didn't worry about what might happen, and she didn't fret about what to do. She d

25. Desktop Cheerleaders

Empowerment Crafts 4 WomenShe had a secure job as a corporate account executive,But she really wanted to be a pastry chef.It would mean going back to schooland borrowing money for rent and tuition.Her neighbor, an elderly woman, told her,"Life i

26. Fetch the Towels: The Art of Female Ejaculation

A Wet, Hot HistoryFemale ejaculation is the greatest thing in the entire world.  It’s above winning the lottery and getting a seat on a crowded subway.  The underground, avant-garde art of squirting can open doors of new sexual pleasure for

27. Reflecting Compliments

Why We Deflect Compliments and Positive Messages, and How to Take Them In Many of us hesitate to accept compliments or positive messages about ourselves. Some of us even outright deflect or reject them. Yet taking in a real compliment or acknowledgi

28. When Opportunity Rings, Don't Run for the Door!

What on earth is that ringing I hear? I've been waiting for a knock, the sweet knock of opportunity, but ringing? What on earth could it be? Maybe it's the door bell, though that's not the sound the door bell usually makes. Hmmm, maybe I should go ch

29. Your Path to a "Strong Body, Ageless Body": An Interview with Fitness Trainer Erin O'Brien

Having trouble getting kick-started on that New Year's Resolution for good health? Has it become easier to make excuses than it is to make it to the gym? Are you pregnant - and not sure how to start up a fitness routine, or know what to do? Fitness

30. The Vision Board

Empowerment Crafts 4 WomenA week had gone by since she made her New Year's resolutions and all the intentions she set forth had already been forgotten. Another year was about to slip through her fingers again.How could she let herself down like this?

31. Erotic Fiction That Isn't Afraid To Be Erotic

There are far too many book out there that tout themselves about as "erotic fiction" when in fact they rarely have the cojones to go beyond the trite sex scenes that appear in every Danielle Steele book - a wayward nipple and heaving bosoms

32. Condomania

Condoms are our friends. Have you stopped to think of all the wonderful things condoms do for us? They are cheap, effective, readily available, and completely unpretentious. But thanks to the defamatory statements made by abstinence-only groups, cert

33. Tokyo: An Itinerary for the Insane

Tokyo is Disneyland with a chronic hard-on. Not to say that it's sex-crazed (although that could be argued either way) but simply in that it's impossible to imagine until you're there. Once you are there, you'll realize: Well I'll be damned; it is li

34. Puppy Love

There are several disturbing signs that our culture has gone too far into the realms of utter fantasy. The Sims phenomenon, penis-enlarging pills, the idea that "Just Say No" is an effective preventative measure against drugs, alcohol and p

35. Engrish Pictures

My time in the Land of Rising Insanity has ended for the time being. I have so many fond memories of Japan. Knowing English fluently there is like walking around town with a giant decoder ring, finding humor and irony around every corner. While prepa

36. Ella, Interrupted

Cinderella pisses me off. Okay, perhaps that's not the most popular opinion ever expressed. But any adult woman with a brain and a spine that actually work in tandem from time to time should be able to see some of the grossly nauseating messages and

37. While You Can

Madeline knew she shouldn't be going there. The alcohol greased her wheels, but she was lucid enough to realize it was going to cause problems. The last thing she needed was to make this more complicated, but she was horny and wouldn't be getting la

38. What Up, G?

Never has so much hype surrounded a single consonant. Some of us can recall how back in the day some of the best minds in medicine and psychiatry told women that if they weren't able to orgasm through traditional, missionary style vaginal penetration

39. All You Have To Do Is Ask

Sometimes in life, we feel as if we are helpless, that our life is out of our own control. What's amazing, though, is that sometimes, if you want to make your dreams reality, all you have to do is ask.

40. Mothering Ourselves

There are so many of us who didn't get the kind of nurturance and love that we needed as children - the kind of nurturance that our society associates with mothers. Not having received that nurturance or gentle care can leave long-lasting effects, th

41. Some Kind of Feminist

"What are you?" he asked me. "Some kind of feminist?"A smile spread across his face. He thought he was joking.My boyfriend, Ben, posed this question to me nearly three years ago during our first date. He peppered me with questions

42. Five Foot Eight (Almost)

I am taller than my husband.I am taller than my mother. I am taller than my sister.I'm not taller than my brothers or my Dad.I am not a giant. I am five eight, or almost five eight. I am very close to five foot eight inches.My husband is five foot si

43. Tearing Down the Clubhouse

There seems to be an upshot to your children hitting 5 years of age. Now, it can happen before that. A friend from years back declared this change when her first of three girls hit 4.The One-Sex Only Party.The clubhouse was built - the sign

44. Memoirs of a Modern Day Housewife (Part 3)

It was a busy day at the store. As I stood in line for the cashier, my cart overflowed with the ingredients necessary for a growing household: eggs, milk, cheese, band-aids, paintbrushes, socks, bargain youth chapter book. Thank God for the store's a

45. Memoirs of a Modern Day Housewife (Part 4)

"Spoiled" "It's just different," she told me. "The quantity of time that you get to spend with them on a regular basis. It gives you different opportunities." This very intelligent, articulate, successful corporate caree

46. Experiencing Annie Leibovitz: A Feminist Perspective

An InvitationRecently, friends of mine invited me to the Annie Leibovitz exhibit showing at the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, DC. Knowing very little about Leibovitz, aside from the fact that she photographed typically shy stars and was a le

47. Reflections on the Montreal Massacre

What Feminism Means (Or Doesn't Mean) TodayThe end of one year and the start of another has always been a popular time for reflection. Lately I have been reflecting on what it means to be a feminist. I have been trying to understand what it means to

48. Notes from the Opt-Out Universe

As a twelve-year veteran of the suburban "opt-out" culture, I am intrigued by the renewed and misguided discourse on the social dynamics of the insular universe I inhabit. I see the points that are being made. In record numbers, we are gett

49. Memoirs of a Modern Day Housewife (Part 2)

As I made my way out of my civilian 5:00am boot camp class with my younger sister, a well-intentioned, conversational woman asked, "What do you do for a living?" I looked over to her and realized she was addressing my sister when she added,

50. Dead Person

I saw my first dead person on the weekend. I have dealt with few deaths in my forty-two years here on this earth. A car hit my cat when I was six. I don't mean to make a joke. This cat was my first death experience. I watched her die. She meant a lot