Earlier tonight, I posted something about the sign in front of my small town’s historical museum and how it had been vandalized (if you can really call the reshuffling of vinyl letters on a flimsy plastic board, vandalism). As I mentioned, given the adolescent reference to a certain bodily function in the sign (post-vandalism), I chose not to include a photo… But, as quick as you can say “RSS,” I started getting notes from readers after posting it, demanding that I stay true to the mission of this site (whatever that is) and get my ass out there with my camera to document the offense. So, I got the dog and hiked over to Huron Street, in the rain. And here’s the photo… I hope it brings you some pleasure. (I should point out that I did not contact the museum to make sure that there wasn’t in fact going to be a historical retrospective on local queefing. So, if you’re into such thiings, you might want to make a call, just in case. I’m 99% certain, however, that “queef” was meant to be “quilt” though.)
update: The following comment was just left by our friend Alicia. I didn’t think it possible, but she’s come up with a plausible explanation as to why the sign might be switching back and forth from “quilt” to “queef” (other than vandalism):
Actually quilts and queefs are related, which this exhibit may demonstrate.
Just as, I’m told, men sometimes pass gas in all-male company in a joking, male-bonding ritual, queefing (originally quilf, with a silent “L”) originated in quilting circles where performing this otherwise socially unacceptable act reinforced the group unity.
For further reading on this subject, see “Of Knickers and Needles: The Normative Function of Vaginal Gas in Colonial Female Communal Identity,” (more here and here.)
So, with this in mind, I’ve just formulated a new theory — Ypsi is home to a prank playing female ghost, who, in life, had been the member of a local quilting circle… Legend has it that she died from an embolism during a meeting of said quilting circle, after sucking in too much air for the purposes of delivering a humorous queef. To this day, people claim to be able to hear the faint call of her queef as they walk along the banks of the Huron at night.
8 Comments
That is fucking fabulous, Mark. Thank you.
Do you think they’ll be showing historical queefs? Will the Starkweather queefs be on display?
Ah, yes, the Starkweather queef’s a classic. I’m partial to the work of the Norris school myself though… Very primitive, yet beautiful.
I’m completely offended by all of this talk about old queefs. Aren’t you two above all of this?
So what is the best way to exhibit queefs? Are they under glass?
Henry Ford had Thomas Edison’s last breath sealed in a glass tube. There’s no reason to think that he wasn’t doing the same thing with queefs.
I wonder if there might be a market for queefs from historic figures trapped in glass tubes…. Hmmmm…. I need to get together a focus group and test it out. There might still be time to rush a hermetically-sealed “Martha Washington queef” out by Christmas.
Actually quilts and queefs are related, which this exhibit may demonstrate.
Just as, I’m told, men sometimes pass gas in all-male company in a joking, male-bonding ritual, queefing (originally quilf, with a silent “L”) originated in quilting circles where performing this otherwise socially unacceptable act reinforced the group unity.
For further reading on this subject, see “Of Knickers and Needles: The Normative Function of Vaginal Gas in Colonial Female Communal Identity,” (more at http://xroads.virginia.edu/~ma02/index/freed-index/Quilts/QuiltingSocial.html and http://www.neilandchristy.com/rdpics/3.html)
On one hand, I really love that this connection was made – things like this are what I love about the internet, and about having this site – but, on the other hand, the I find the idea of these long-dead women passing vaginal farts through their knitting to be absolutely nauseating… Thank you for sharing, Alicia… even though it makes me want to puke. My appreciation for American history, by the way, is now pretty much dead.