is the word 'diary' better than the word 'blog'? probably not.
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The Terror.
Being away from San Francisco has made me realize something that remained veiled for as long as I lived here full-time. What I mean is that I have become consciously aware of The Terror. I have an irrational terror of the last 1.5 blocks of the walk home to my house on any given evening. It isn't because the last 1.5 blocks are any more or less dangerous than any other portion of my walk. It's because once, seven or eight years ago, I was attacked approximately one block from my house by a guy who wanted to rape me. Sure, I fought him off and got away with not much more than bruises and a black eye. And, in the long run, I was glad he picked me to harass instead of someone who wasn't trained for such an encounter. But still. It makes an impact.
I had never stopped to think about the fact of The Terror, nor the reasons for it. I just knew that I hated having to walk home alone at night, and that I often felt terrified, but only during the last 1.5 blocks. This fear would often make me behave irrationally, like waiting for very long periods of time for a ride from someone when I really wanted to go home earlier. Or taking a taxi for a few blocks. Or deciding not to go over to Evany's house to watch TV because then I'd have to walk home. Or deciding not to drive to, for instance, Evany's house because then I'd have to walk home from my car after I parked it later. (Sometimes it was as if Evany knew this and, back when she had a car, she would compensate by offering to drive me home later, even though that is an insane thing to offer when I live only 12 blocks from her house.) I don't want you to think that The Terror would occur because I would have to walk past The Spot where It Happened. No, it is not so simple. The Terror became part of any segment of the last 1.5 blocks on the way home to my house.
Being in Amherst and then being back here made me realize that a) The Terror exists and b) it is irrational, but nonetheless c) it is reasonable. That's right: it is both irrational and reasonable. It is irrational for the reason I already stated: there is no reason to believe that I am any more or less safe during those 1.5 blocks than I am at any other moment on my walk home, or, really, any other moment in general. But The Terror is nonetheless reasonable because we all know that we are in danger, especially if we are female, in this violent and largely misogynistic society. And most of us know that any security we have in our lives is relative and exceedingly disrupt-able. There is no such thing as inviolable security.
(On the subject of the level of violence of U.S. society, whenever one of my students wants to pronounce a blanket condemnation about the violent practice of some other culture, I say I will allow him or her his or her opinion but I will add that I am not so sure, coming from one of the most violent cultures ever to populate and then to try to dominate the earth, that I am able to make meaningful judgments about all forms of violence in other cultures. Some I am fairly sure are wrong�say, genital mutilation�whereas with others, like some tribal initiations, I am not so sure about how their cruelty ranks alongside the U.S. prison system, or our culture's indifference to the poverty it creates and ignores.)
But I was speaking of The Terror, by which I mean, for now, my own private Terror, as opposed to all the larger Terrors to which I am a party simply by being a citizen of the United States. Sometimes I wonder whether the fact of The Terror means that I should move away from this apartment, in order to avert The Terror. But I really like the apartment, plus it's rent controlled and I've been here for ten years. Moving would probably mean leaving San Francisco, given current socio-economic realities. Plus, there is no reason to think that The Terror is actually geographically located. It might be that 1.5 blocks from home will always be terrifying. For instance, the walk from my car to the front door in Amherst (all 20-30 feet of it) is slightly terrifying, even though there is no one around, and people don't even lock their doors in Amherst. (I do.)
I realize that this is not exactly the Christmas Miracle narrative we expect this time of year. But if you need to you can concentrate on the fact that I fought off a rapist who had me pinned with my face to the concrete by waiting for him to move one of his arms so I could flip him over and elbow him in the face, so that I could then turn around and begin kicking him until he fled. If nothing else, that should remind me (and, perhaps, you) that when something terrifying really happens, I am usually calm instead of panicked.
1:23 p.m. - December 24, 2004
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