#MeToo

I mean, who hasn't been groped, grabbed, or intimidated, right? It almost feels embarrassing to pull up old stories and share them because I feel that, well, it's something that all women (and probably lots of men) have to deal with in their lives, and we all just get on with things. But this week, thanks to many brave souls who are speaking out against Harvey Weinstein, it is being talked about, as it should be. So here are my stories, even though this feels a bit attention-seeking (cringe). I hope it doesn't read that way.

The first time, I was a fifteen year old girl, hopping into a car with some of my friends. An older guy was in the back seat, squeezed between me and one of my girlfriends. I didn't know him, a friend of somebody's sort-of boyfriend. He was probably nineteen or twenty. Not half a block from my house, he reached over and stuck his hand in my crotch, jiggling it. When I slapped his hand away, he laughed and said 'God, what a virgin!' As if that were something to laugh about. As if that were something to be ashamed of. Everybody in the car laughed. I felt myself turn scarlet, at the violation and the humiliation, crossed my arms and legs away from him and made myself as small as possible. That was the first.

Then there was the boy in school who came back from the bathroom into sophomore algebra class and stage whispered 'I just peed on my hand' while he wiped his wet fingers across my cheek. That same boy who would put his foot in my backside as I crouched in front of my locker to retrieve books, who kicked my chair whenever he walked by. Who supposedly liked me.

Then there were the countless - really countless - times that my body was grabbed in pubs and nightclubs in Ireland as an older teen and a twenty-something. It usually went something like this: standing in a crowded spot, queueing for a drink at the bar, and I would feel a hand on my backside, sometimes in between my legs. I would spin around, angry and ready with some harsh words, and two or three lads would be behind me, acting like nothing was happening, or point at each other, faces serious, feigning an apology for the other's behavior. What do you do in that situation? Give a dirty look, tell the to eff off - those seemed to be the only possibilities, since I couldn't tell who had touched me. Or just ignore them, which is what I usually did.

Then there was the time I stood on the south end of O'Connell Street in Dublin, waiting for the bus to college. It was early in the day, and I had an assignment to turn in at ten in a seminar. I remember standing at the end of the bus queue, watching down the street for the bus, and suddenly being violently spun around by the elbow, a man's angry face blurring towards mine, and then warm spit all over my face. He was gone, dissolved into the crowd of pedestrians as quickly as he'd appeared. Two people in the queue turned towards me - a man and a woman. I stood there, shocked, saliva covering my glasses and cheek. The man started quizzing me - Who was that? What did you do to him? No, surely you know him. Why would he spit in your face if you hadn't done something to him? He probably heard your accent, that's it. Lots of people don't like Americans, you know.

I sputtered back answers. But I didn't know him. I hadn't been talking, I'd been standing silently, waiting for a bus. I started to cry as the angry man's warm spit ran towards my mouth. Could I have a tissue, somebody, please? The man in front of me handed me a tissue, tutted, and turned his back; the woman just stared. I didn't know what to do. Call my boyfriend? Go to the cops? Get on the bus and go to class? I got on the bus because, you know, that assignment was due at ten, and if nobody in the queue believed me, why would the cops? Once on campus, I bolted off the bus to the nearest bathroom and scrubbed my face and glasses with hand soap for what felt like ages. My skin was cracking with the dryness for the rest of the day. Yeah, it wasn't a sexual assault, but it happened to me because I was a young woman, of that I am sure, and disbelieved because of that too.

That summer I was in Rome, visiting a friend, when I went to make a phone call in one of those international telephone shops, tiny phone booths lining one wall. I was the only customer. When I hung up the phone, the man who had been behind the counter was spreadeagled inches behind me in the booth, completely blocking my way, smirking. My heart stopped. I asked him to move in very poor Italian, and when he didn't, I shoved him out of the way. He laughed as I ran from the shop.

Then there was the time that still makes me shake, and I hate talking about it. Thirteen years later, safe at home, happily married and expecting my second child, I can feel my hands starting to tremble as I write this. It was the next year, my final year of college, and I was home in Cork for Easter break. It was a beautiful weekend afternoon, sunny and warm, and I went out for a run. My parents lived in a small rural community outside of the city, and like most rural parts of Ireland, the roads were lined with high stone walls covered in brambles. A mile or so from the house, I turned up a hill by the parish church. That particular road was long and steep, usually very quiet, with no houses or other roads intersecting it on either side. A battered-looking white panel van with no windows in the back came down the hill towards me and I heard it stop after it passed. I heard a sliding door bang open. I looked around and three men were running towards me. I kept running. I remember that my only reaction was confusion, thinking 'this is weird, what are they doing?' Then a car came down the hill and slowed - I looked again and saw the van tearing off. I kept going. The car looped back; a young couple inside, clearly shaken, insisted on giving me a lift home. They said they had seen the men chasing me, stopped to help, and the men legged it back to the van and drove off. The couple followed the van for a bit and noticed that its front and back number plates didn't match. Of course, I then had to ask myself if I should trust these people enough to get in their car. I sort of had to.

When I got home, my older brother was the only one there. I remember how he held me once the story spilled out. He sat with me while I called the local Garda station (the Irish police). The guard I spoke with laughed and said 'ah sure, twas probably just a few lads pulling a prank.' Lads in their forties. Lads who I didn't know. My parents came home a few minutes later, and I remember how upset my dad was when I told him about the guard's response. He phoned a reporter who lived nearby, who then rang the station to ask a few questions. Within a half hour, the sergeant was at my parents' front door, very serious, and ready to interview me.

I have asked myself many, many times over the years if those men were really coming after me, if they were truly going to bundle me into the van and do horrible things, and I've come up with some pretty good alternate explanations of why anyone would chase a young woman up an empty rural road. I still don't particularly want to believe the most obvious conclusion myself.

But nothing had happened to me. Thank God. I wasn't raped. I wasn't kidnapped. Far, far worse actually happens to others. But beyond the incidents themselves, the things that stand out to me, that make me feel sick with emotion are the times when I wasn't believed. I can't imagine what it's like for people who are raped and who are then questioned, laughed at, disbelieved, accused. The humiliation. The frustration. The fury.