We Got Served!
by fiona
2010-01-20 18:23:03 PDT
Clay and I got subpoenas today-- going to bylaw court against that guy whose dog charged us and bit Simon in the face when we were out walking. That should be an interesting experience, and I am going to look as vulnerably pregnant as possible. Okay, actually I look ridiculous, like a bobblehead of myself if the bobbleheady part had become lodged in my midsection, but no one at court needs to know that. I will strive to look misty and weepy and in touch with my sacred but fragile womanliness, like someone who would have her nude newborn photographed in a bed of flowers.
(Which, I've wondered lately: if you're going to do that stuff to your baby at all, why not dress them in a suit and pose them in an office setting? Why are those Anne Geddes-type babies always costumed at this weird intersection of fertility and constructed innocence-- bees, bunnies, fruit, eggs? I wonder why the objectification thing gets less okay as the specialness/innocence factor decreases-- like, why no babies dressed as gas station attendants? I am not gonna look this up, though, for fear of ending up on some corner of the internet where adults dress up in diapers and mate with whales or something.)
Cultural Pregnancy Irritation #46 aside, it's amazing to me how little responsibility this guy feels for his big, scary dog's behaviour, that he's actually willing to go to court and bluster when this is his year-old dog's 4th recorded offence, and 2nd bite. He's that sure he has a whisper of rightness here. Damn. How do people end up with senses of entitlement like this? Are they just more evolved than us, able to do-- no, absolutely justified in doing at all times and in all situations-- whatever they want? I need to get on that action, because training my dog to not intrude on people's personal space was kind of a hassle.
Which reminds me of Cultural Pregnancy Irritation #22: Don't Fucking Touch Me. Last week a young female student at the conference I went to, total stranger, trotted up to me and squealed "BABY!" (Um, not quite, but "ALIENY FETUS!" just isn't Anne Geddes enough I guess.) I just ignored her and continued my conversation with some school friends, because seriously, fuck off, until she stretched her paws out to my midsection, at which point I said pleasantly, "I'll break your hand," and she gave me the wet-eyed look of womany hurt and how to explain to someone like that that no, you do not get to have your feelings hurt simply because you didn't get your own way, which in this case was groping a stranger's body? And you don't get to have your feelings hurt either, Jay Leno!
I wonder if the case will be settled by dance-off, in true You Got Served fashion. If so, I'm fucked.