Flashes

I am currently living with a friend, who is by the way a girl. I've never lived with a girl before but don't imagine it to be all too bad, for several reasons. First, I get along better with females than males. I'm just more sensitive, not in the caring way, but in the way when I get horsed around by men, I don't like it and get offended easily. Secondly, I've almost lived with a girl before. In the late years of high school and the early years of college I had a very serious girlfriend and practically hung out with her every waking moment. We dated for two and a half years and it didn't end well.

Anyway, constantly being around my ex-girlfriend has had more of an influence than I had expected. We broke up three years ago, so you'd think it would be all done and over with, but it isn't. No, surprisingly enough, there is still an effect. I can't really describe it well so bare with me. Ashlie is my roommate and whenever I don't see her and think of her, either back at the apartment or memories of us eating dinner or watching movies and TV, I'll remember her as Heidi, my old girlfriend. Even now as I was writing this email while Ashlie is still asleep, I picture her in the near future coming out, but not coming out as Ashlie, she's coming out of the room as Heidi in my mind, and it's disturbing me. You'd think that after I have realized this, self-professed this strange occurrence that it would go away, but it hasn't. I've told Ashlie about this and she thought it strange as well, but it still hasn't ended. It still hasn't stopped. What do I have to do to end this? How long will it take for me to live with Ashlie for it not to happen anymore? When can I start picture Ashlie as Ashlie and not as Heidi?

Spending time with someone 24/7 has it's lasting effects, and since I hadn't really done it for three years and then all of a sudden thrown back into it, I guess my past had to catch up with me. When in such close quarters and for so long of a period and us both not working, makes any sane person want to strangle the other. Obviously, it hasn't gotten to that point yet, but I'm just curious as to how long this process will need to take before it wears off, because honestly, I can't wait until my mind is fully flushed of Heidi, and I can picture Ashlie with her dreads and all.

He's

I want to first and most importantly state that I am a feminist, as much as I can be entitled, but this is only an example from two situations that occurred personally. So, by no means am I unaware of the implications caused by a male-dominated pronoun.

With that said, the first situation occurred at work conversing with a good friend and we were talking about a band, that will go unnamed. It was then bestowed upon me by my good friend that the lead singer was gay, commented as, "You know, he's gay."

The second situation occurred at church conversing with someone, and we were talking about companies and such, and was told about the CEO of one of the companies as, "You know, he's a Christian."

My first instinct in response to both of these are the same, "Oh, yeah," said with mild surprise. The first can be interpreted as homophobic or something along those lines. The second happens constantly with what I feel like as something that should be more a side note than a main point. One descriptive word should not entail us to judge based solely on that one word. What is the point to describe a person by one word than to make that person painted in a better or worse light. One single word should not make me feel all secure knowing that some CEO is a Christian. So what if he's a Christian, so what if he's gay. Does that define him as a person. What I have also noticed is that we, as society, don't use these descriptive words in reference to political standing or leanings. We don't simply state that he is a conservative or a liberal and leave it at that. The focus of the conversation leads easily into the political background of that particular person. Not so with these two descriptive words. I'm always at a dead loss of what to really say when given this description.

Yeah, okay, he's a Christian, does that mean that's he's good, or better than a non-Christian CEO? Does that mean that he'll run his company ethically and morally right? Does a gay artist make me want to no longer listen to that artist or band? Not necessarily, but this is what these descriptive words want us to think, imagine and judge.

Please, if you are going to describe someone with a single descriptive word, I pledge that you hesitate and consider the implications and motivation behind what you intend to mean. Before blurting out, he's so and so, think and put the words behind the description, and not have an unreasonable assumption made with one word.