WHY: Because of the Plane Trees

This is not a political substack. I am a fairly political person, and so I often share other substack posts that may be political in the Notes section. I can’t help it, I was born and raised this way. But this substack is not about poltics. That would be some major mission creep.

Todays WHY, though, is a very personal post that is political, to the extent that the personal is political. It’s a link to a flash creative nonfiction piece I published six years ago, titled, “Why I am OK With the C on My First French Test,” that was published in the Burningword Literary Review. When I wrote it, I was trying to study French online and it was not going well, which was why I spent the last two years studying it in person. The piece was written after the 2018 Kavanaugh hearings and before the pandemic, January 6. So after a lot. But also before a lot. So keep that in mind.

It’s about living as a woman in the United States, where misogny is often up close and personal. In the last six years, this has only gotten worse. For me personally, for many women. Much worse. So it might be triggering. Also keep that in mind in deciding whether or not to click the link. Here.

I’m not so naive to think that France doesn’t have its own problems with misogny, something that was unfortunately made very clear this past week (again, trigger warning). But it’s not so much in my face there—if only because the subtleties of the language are largely lost on me, no matter how much I study it.

At any rate, another WHY. But even if you don’t feel like clicking on it, take a moment and just enjoy the plane trees below.