The best advice I’ve ever been given by my therapist is to make men as uncomfortable as they make me.
She tells me this as I sit in her office at 11 a.m. It is summertime in London and there is no air conditioning. The window is open and the curtains are blowing in the breeze, but it doesn’t feel like a breeze, just an exhale of heat inhaled by the room. I am sweating and I do not know if it is because of the weather or the therapy, but it somehow feels like both.
“That seems dangerous,” I tell her. I have seen too many episodes of Law and Order: SVU and I know how most of the stories end: Girl in ditch. Girl in hospital. Girl in casket.
She tells me that I can’t live my life in fear of men.
I am silent.
“Just do little things, nothing harmful or malicious,” she explains. “Take back your right to exist in the world without being afraid of stepping on a man’s toes.”
A month later, I move to New York City to re-learn how to be a person who exists in the world without being afraid of stepping on a man’s toes
***
It’s been eight months since that conversation with my therapist, and most days, I still find myself with clenched fists and a tightened jaw. Often, I sink into a shell of myself and avoid side streets and sidewalk cracks and sideways glances.
But some days—the good days—I find myself looking towards the sky. If I squint, I’ve found that skyscrapers fade into my periphery and I realize that I am a still and breathing and courageous body.
On the good days, I am more passionate than panicked. On the good days, I remember that there is still work to be done, and I follow my therapist’s advice. I remind myself to decimate the egos of the very men who make mine disintegrate. On the good days, I find humor in discomfort.
I’ve composed a guide for the good days. It’s for those who find comfort in side-stepping confrontation, for those who find their own hurt and fear in my words. It is a guide that’s inspired by my success in recovering myself and by my friends’ stories, as well. It is a guide on reclaiming my personhood and embracing my femininity.
Guide for the Good Days (aka A Guide for Making Men Uncomfortable in New York City):
- Step 1: Take all the confidence from every corner of every crevice of your being and put it in one hand, then sprinkle it all over the corner of 5th Avenue and 14th Street. Wait for a man with good fashion sense, plaid pants, and sleepy eyes to help you pick it up. He will smell like the frozen foods section. When he asks you to get lunch, tell him, “I have IBS so nothing spicy or else I may shit my pants,” and then listen as silence settles over the city.
- Step 2: When a man abrasively flirts with you and your roommate near Penn Station on Halloween, embrace the fact that the two of you are dressed as witches. Pretend to cast a curse on him. Tell him that his vest is ugly—because it is. And honesty is important.
- Step 3: When a boy in one of your classes asks if you can clench your “vagina muscles” to stop your period from coming, tell him yes. And proceed to scrunch your face and squeeze your fists and tell him that you’re doing it right now.
- Step 4: When a boy kisses you at a bar, burp in his mouth and then ask him why he did that.
- Step 5: Ask any boy you meet if he’s from Jersey. When he says “no,” look shocked and tell him, “Wow, I’m surprised. I really got those vibes from you.” (If he says “yes”, sigh and say: “Fitting”).
- Step 6: Sign your ex-fling up for email newsletters for things he dislikes or has no interest in. Does he like hunting? PETA has a fabulous newsletter. Let his confusion be your closure.
- Step 7: Walk in a straight line down 6th avenue and watch the faces of businessmen distort into visions of outrage and disbelief when you don’t move out of their way.
- Step 8: Stare back.
***
It’s been eight months since that conversation with my therapist and although I have more work to do, I have found healing in humor.
I find myself laughing in situations where I probably shouldn’t be laughing.
I find myself sitting in sunshine on side streets.
I find myself watching grass grow in the sidewalk cracks.
I find myself returning sideways glances with a smile.
I find myself in New York—a person who exists in the world without being afraid of stepping on a man’s toes.