Big Sex Little Death: A Memoir by Susie Bright

Author:Susie Bright
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Biography & Autobiography, Feminism & Feminist Theory, Social Science, Women
ISBN: 9780970881564
Publisher: Susie Bright
Published: 2010-11-18T10:00:00+00:00

Relocation

Marty was still in the hospital, but he was stable. Seventeen stab wounds to the chest, and he never lost consciousness. His wife told me that when she got him out of there, she was getting out of the IS for good. I wondered if she’d have any trouble convincing him.

We were supposed to get “back to business.” Every morning, we’d begin with a meeting, and after we stopped donating blood, we weren’t supposed to talk about Marty anymore. Move on; don’t look back. I was a malingerer.

The morning meetings began at Larry’s Diner downstairs, with the coffee and doughnut order. Red, another comrade from East Oakland, would ask me for money for a doughnut.

“Why are you asking me?”

“You look like a rich white girl.”

“You are high.”

“Always, always, sugar pie —” Then he’d hit up Hank. And then Chili, and then Steve P. Finally, one of them would give in. I couldn’t figure it out, because Red made more money dealing that all of us put together. He just didn’t believe in paying for himself.

Michael ignored him. Red never asked Michael for a doughnut. And I don’t think I saw Mikey ever eat anything as strong as coffee or doughnuts. He would order a glass of hot milk and a piece of toast. When I asked him about his diet, he just shook his head.

“Ulcers.”

“You’re nineteen; there’s no such thing as ulcers.” But maybe Michael did have a special ulcerated intestine that affected only young men who looked like they hadn’t had a carefree moment since they were in diapers.

Whatever happened at Larry’s, set the tone for the group criticism to come. It followed us right up the stairs to our big room overlooking the original Ford plant. In bad weather, you could watch the rain fall right onto the old shop floors. All the factory’s windows were knocked out.

“How come they don’t open the Ford factory for tours or something?” I once asked. “I mean, it’s historic!”

“People here are trying to get out of factories, Sue, not into them,” Chewy said. He always had a stern word for me.

Sure, everyone in Detroit was dying to get out of the factories and move to California, except for demented communists like us who were trying to get in.

You didn’t count for shit in the IS until you got an shop-floor union job. But none of our comrades could help me get a job, because they were all known “agitators.” The last thing a company was going to do was hire another one of their little pinko friends.

Without friends, how did you get work? I showed up in job application queues that circled for a mile around the block and was turned away. I was too young to pull it off against local folks my parents’ age.

So far, I had a night shift at McDonald’s, and a part-time nonunion factory job making carburetor parts in Royal Oak. Hot oil and metal filings settled into the pores of my hands, as if I were a caricature of the Incredible Hulk.

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