So, how about that weather? Isn't the new jet stream pattern so refreshing? Do you want to build a snowman or maybe sit around and continue to deny that climate change is not only real but physically impacting all of our lives?
Let's stop doing that second thing. Let's stop pretending that throwing our hands up in front of our faces and saying, "No, I don't like coming to terms with reality because reality is icky and uncomfortable and I have to make some changes in my life and I DON'T WANNA!" is going to change the fact that reality is hard and immutable, like a bus barreling down the road, headed right for us. It doesn't matter if we say "No, I don't WANNA" to the bus. It's not going to magically not crush us against the wall of its physical reality. It's coming straight at us. We have to move, and we have to move now, or we're going to have to clean up a lot of viscera in our near future.
And it isn't just the climate. This dangerous denial of reality and all of its consequences appears to have infected a great number of citizens here in the U.S. There is a cult (yes) of willful ignorance, hell bent on injecting fear and disorder into society and, frankly, they've done an extraordinary job thus far.
I had a conversation with some folks today about reality, perception, belief, and action. The core of it was how horrifying the enactment of poorly understood philosophical assumptions, specifically the one about beliefs being just as valid as reality because possible multiverses 'n' stuff, is affecting the social construct. The actual fabric of our society is straining because so many people are callously and selfishly doing whatever the fuck they want.
That's really bad. Let me explain why.
Doing whatever one wants, regardless of whether it hurts another, is anti-social behaviour. The reason it's called anti-social behaviour is that it negatively impacts society. You know, that agreement we have with each other as social animals, where we do our best to live peacefully and respectfully so that we all may benefit from things like clean water, fresh air, lives relatively free of oppression and violence, safety and food for our children and selves... yes. Society.
The alternative to society is anarchy, which might sound like a pretty romantic notion if you've never committed yourself to realizing how much terror, agony, cruelty, and inhumane action will happen if we manage to achieve actual anarchy. Some might find that scenario acceptable. God help their blind souls. But anarchy is like a vacuum. Nature and power-hungry leaders abhor a vacuum. If and when we are in complete disorder, there will be an entity of aggression who will come and put us in order. Their order. Do you think we'll be able to fight back effectively, even as individuals with personal arsenals, against a force that wields organized, funded armies, quite possibly with nuclear capability? Our best, individual hopes would then become dying in a blaze of "glory." This might work for some, but it does not work for most. We cannot ask others to suffer and or die for our causes. Not the glorious ones and certainly not the petty ones.
Let's talk about these petty ones. Firstly, I'm going to call any cause that does not directly promote life and existence as petty. It's about needs versus wants. Needs are glorious. Wants are petty. I need food to live. I want that food to be delicious and wonderful. I can live on food that isn't delicious and wonderful, so that want is a petty cause. Let me use a widely known current example of a passionately carried but petty cause:
There are folks who are screaming about some war on Christmas. They've gotten the notion that everyone needs to believe what they believe and in the way they believe it or they're being oppressed. That's silly. Oppression is when you are disallowed to practice your beliefs under threat of penalty or death. If displaying Christmas decorations caused the authorities to look away as you were being systematically harassed or if they were there to perpetrate the harassment, then you're being oppressed. Being legally afforded less rights without having committed any legal offense is being oppressed. Being asked to allow others to have their own beliefs with as much acceptance as you have yours is not oppression. It's called civility. It's how to be fair, and being fair is how we've managed to have this country that allows us to believe what we believe. This country is founded on Christian values, not on Christianity. If we take a look around, an honest look around, we'll find that Christian values are just good social sense. They're also Jewish values and Muslim values and Taoist values and decent people who have no interest in religion's values. Be kind. Be fair. Be honest. Think first. Reject anger, hatred, violence, and uninformed judgement. Have compassion. Cultivate patience and empathy. Do unto others as you would have done to you.
This so-called "war" is no war. There is no enemy unless one has decided that this *should* be a secular country, in which case I need you to look again at the Constitution and consider if you intend to participate in a religious war by fostering the hatred and othering that it takes to light a fire like that. Refresh your history knowledge about the viscera remaining after religious wars. Go look at the photos of refugee children, lost and bloody and empty. Picture your own children there. We don't want this. No amount of discomfort when faced with our own privilege is worth that horror.
Where we should be fighting is in the war against poverty. That's a war. That's a glorious cause, because the continuation or cessation of lives absolutely hangs in the balance. Poverty is not about being offended or socially uncomfortable as our privilege is pointed out. It's about starvation, desperation, untreated medical issues, death by dehydration or exposure or neglect or violence borne of the chronic trauma that is poverty. We need to improve this situation. We, the people, the mass of us who are supposed to create a social net for all of us. Why? Because it's the right thing to do. Need more self-justification? Because you need that social net, too. Running water. Safe food. A reasonable assurance that if you, yourself, fell on hard times, that the rest of us would be there for you, if only in our taxes.
Frankly, when I look at the folks who are celebrating the so-called "freedoms" we are about to experience under our new President/Cabinet/Congress, I have to wonder if we're going to be okay in the end. There's so much dangerous rhetoric that we, as a species, have seen before and have sworn again and again that we will not let happen. But we've become complacent. Perhaps glutted by our ability to tune out via social media (which, by the way, is mostly fantasy that is deceptively real looking), our vulgar consumerism, our collective lack of willpower to do the right things even though they aren't "fun", and our unkind actions that we seem to be justifying by our own comfort or dark glee. I wonder if there will be enough of us who can read the news and generally judge if it's journalism or propaganda. I wonder if the level headed, the concerned, the long-game players, will also be our hard-standing opposition to the selfishness and blind greed that now seems imminent. So far, I hear a lot of murmuring without focus. I'm here. Where are you? Why won't you speak loudly in the face of bigotry, sexism, wanton environmental destruction? You won't be alone. I'm here. I'll stand with you.
And, if it is to be that you're choosing the self-serving path that is peppered with unkindness... well, know that I'm standing before you, telling you that you've got it wrong. I won't stop doing that. I won't stop pointing out the privilege, I won't stop pushing back against inequality, I won't stop defending you and everyone else who needs it. Not wants it. Needs it.
Let's do this.
Friday, January 6, 2017
Wednesday, August 26, 2015
On Trauma and Forever Finding Triggers
Well, shit.
I'm particularly vulnerable right now. The ricochet changes in weather are aggravating the deep, sharp pain of arthritis, making my outlook decidedly more dim than I'd prefer. The pain makes me sad and jumpy, drives my depression, and causes more felt pain. Quite the cycle, that.
Yesterday was just another moment of what seems to be an endless stream of objectification, misogyny, and patriarchal horseshit. Some jackass, with whom I had previously had a friendly, professional "relationship" managed to say a single sentence that struck me so hard, I felt as stripped and dirty as if I had actually been standing there in only my work apron, as he so flippantly suggested.
I'm reeling today. I'm lost and in shock and in tears. I'm not sure, but I might be fresh out of indignation and standing only on shame. Half of me continues on, understanding that this bullshit is, entirely, bullshit. That people should not say such things to relative strangers. Hell, the only person who can tell me that I should work in my apron only while fondling me with his eyeballs is my partner. That's it. But the other half of me is trying desperately to figure out how to avoid this, how to modify my behaviour, how not to dress, that I am too friendly, that of course it's my fault, somehow.
It's moments like this that bring a wellspring of memory and agony and self-doubt and prolonged terror/shame. I'm sick to my stomach. My throat is tight and my head hurts so much. Mental flashes of all the times I've been stripped naked and injured come flooding in. In my mind's eye, I see the blanket I buried myself in as a little girl and can smell my own fear and panic, can feel the suffocation of breathing my own exhalations back in because it's better to suffocate than to give in and be raped. I can still hear the ticking of the clock downstairs, can feel the late-summer heat of the attic, the tickle of unknown spiders' cobwebs, the roar of my own blood in my own ears as I crush myself smaller and smaller, hoping to become invisible in the dark space of the rafters for when my attackers return. My five year old self is right here. My heart is pounding, I'm trying not to see the soft, promising glint of blade edges in an otherwise empty cabinet. I'm trying not to feel the hard but spongy reverberation of my head bouncing off a dormitory door while a shark-eyed man tells me he loves me and can't wait to introduce me to his mother. My barely twenty year old self is here. My back and my knees remember the bite of sandstone, the silent, scuffling struggle under the stars, the crackle of bonfire and wafting laughter of people not twenty feet away who don't know that I'm fighting a losing battle with a man in a sweatshirt that smells of body odor, vomit, and mortality.
All these things. They come bubbling back up, slick and sticky and fetid.
This doesn't happen every time some asshole strips me bare with words, but it happens often enough that I can string these moments like vulgar pearls onto a necklace that I can't seem to remove. I claw at the clasp and all I manage to do is wound myself, stinging rake marks onto my own throat, bleeding shame and anger at my own shame.
I will never be able to convince myself that it's not my fault, somehow. I will never stop feeling like I should have done something different, every time.
I'm doing that now. The very best thing I can do is scream in rage, howling unholy into the dark, and pray to myself that maybe this time, I can tear this part of myself out and fling it into the wind.
I'm particularly vulnerable right now. The ricochet changes in weather are aggravating the deep, sharp pain of arthritis, making my outlook decidedly more dim than I'd prefer. The pain makes me sad and jumpy, drives my depression, and causes more felt pain. Quite the cycle, that.
Yesterday was just another moment of what seems to be an endless stream of objectification, misogyny, and patriarchal horseshit. Some jackass, with whom I had previously had a friendly, professional "relationship" managed to say a single sentence that struck me so hard, I felt as stripped and dirty as if I had actually been standing there in only my work apron, as he so flippantly suggested.
I'm reeling today. I'm lost and in shock and in tears. I'm not sure, but I might be fresh out of indignation and standing only on shame. Half of me continues on, understanding that this bullshit is, entirely, bullshit. That people should not say such things to relative strangers. Hell, the only person who can tell me that I should work in my apron only while fondling me with his eyeballs is my partner. That's it. But the other half of me is trying desperately to figure out how to avoid this, how to modify my behaviour, how not to dress, that I am too friendly, that of course it's my fault, somehow.
It's moments like this that bring a wellspring of memory and agony and self-doubt and prolonged terror/shame. I'm sick to my stomach. My throat is tight and my head hurts so much. Mental flashes of all the times I've been stripped naked and injured come flooding in. In my mind's eye, I see the blanket I buried myself in as a little girl and can smell my own fear and panic, can feel the suffocation of breathing my own exhalations back in because it's better to suffocate than to give in and be raped. I can still hear the ticking of the clock downstairs, can feel the late-summer heat of the attic, the tickle of unknown spiders' cobwebs, the roar of my own blood in my own ears as I crush myself smaller and smaller, hoping to become invisible in the dark space of the rafters for when my attackers return. My five year old self is right here. My heart is pounding, I'm trying not to see the soft, promising glint of blade edges in an otherwise empty cabinet. I'm trying not to feel the hard but spongy reverberation of my head bouncing off a dormitory door while a shark-eyed man tells me he loves me and can't wait to introduce me to his mother. My barely twenty year old self is here. My back and my knees remember the bite of sandstone, the silent, scuffling struggle under the stars, the crackle of bonfire and wafting laughter of people not twenty feet away who don't know that I'm fighting a losing battle with a man in a sweatshirt that smells of body odor, vomit, and mortality.
All these things. They come bubbling back up, slick and sticky and fetid.
This doesn't happen every time some asshole strips me bare with words, but it happens often enough that I can string these moments like vulgar pearls onto a necklace that I can't seem to remove. I claw at the clasp and all I manage to do is wound myself, stinging rake marks onto my own throat, bleeding shame and anger at my own shame.
I will never be able to convince myself that it's not my fault, somehow. I will never stop feeling like I should have done something different, every time.
I'm doing that now. The very best thing I can do is scream in rage, howling unholy into the dark, and pray to myself that maybe this time, I can tear this part of myself out and fling it into the wind.
Saturday, November 23, 2013
On Wisdom and Character... Neither of Which Comes Naturally to Me
Patience is a virtue. ~Prudentius
Patience, n. A minor form of despair, disguised as a virtue. ~Bierce
Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet. ~Rousseau
Endurance is patience concentrated. ~Carlyle
Are we there yet? ~Me
You're traveling through another dimension (am i? is that why i feel so distant and strange?) -- a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind (especially of mind dear god and boy, do i mind). A journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination (i certainly couldn't have imagined i'd be stretching my own boundaries so far). That's a signpost up ahead (shit. i hate the signs. i don't believe in signs... do i?). Your next stop: The Twilight Zone!
Please. That's not my next stop. I've been in this zone for quite some time now but it never becomes familiar. If and when it does, I'll know I've lost too much of myself to keep being who I think I am or I was.
I've been consciously waiting for things to change because the current situation is unacceptable as a status quo. I don't accept SNAFU as how it should be or how it will continue to be. What's keeping me going in this frozen state is that I'm sure (oh please oh please) it ends soon.
What's needing change, you ask? To be perfectly vague, I need my kid to be okay. His forced emotional state (damn you, justice, in the past) doesn't support that. In addition, I need to make this long distance epic (and I use that word in the old, non-commercially-abused sense) love into an in-our-face, right next to each other, stealing covers and putting the silverware in the wrong place in the tray, basking in each other's glow and glower and boredom and delight epic love. I need the courts to move forward. I need the government to move forward. I need my life to move forward.
Because this extended game intent on stalemate shit has got to go.
Every day and week and month and moment that passes in this swirly grey purgatory, this mundane but pregnant limbo, takes something out of me and replaces it with profound wisdom and, really, total shock at the way I'm handling these thumb screws. I'm losing my wonder but gaining strength. It's hard to think about because it hurts to accept the fact that I can't be both strong and bright (in my heart). As a little girl, even the smallest emotional slight tore my heart up. Now I feel like I'm staring at me from outside my body when broadsword blows to my emotional center barely rock me, let alone knock me off my feet. In the same way, music that moved me is now simply lovely but not profound. Clear, dark skies scattered with cold stars make me smile in a comfortable way but they don't take my breath or light me up with an electric glow anymore.
And that's okay, really. It's just sort of sad in a "yep, that's life" sort of way. It makes me think, though, about all the other people I know who have already done this growing up thing. All the roses with their bloom already off. I think I was a hold out. Maybe I was a late bloomer. Maybe I'm not a rose at all, but something slower and rarer like a night blooming desert flower. Or maybe I'm just getting older and the metaphors are naturally going towards the sun setting type.
So I'm in limbo and have been for a few years now. What am I learning from limbo? Well, I'm learning I can bend to a vulgar degree without breaking. I'm learning that fierce passion like mine can be concentrated and focused into slow burning fuel able to sustain my core through long winters of waiting.
I hate waiting. I'm also very good at it. I just didn't know that.
But now that I've had these revelations and revealed the center of my being, can we just get a move on?
No?
Okay. I'll be over here, reading all the magazines and having all the dreams and learning all the things until it's my turn to move forward. Just don't be surprised if I've rearranged the whole waiting room by the time you get to me. Because I'm here and I don't have a guide, I feel like I have a duty to future limbo dancers. I'll be leaving a map of waiting for the next poor, passionate soul. May they be as lucky as I am and have a stubborn fortitude and wells of patience and enough whimsy to make a life out of it as I have.
Either that or they can go quietly, artistically and positively mad. Which might be exactly what I'm doing. I think this is how eccentrics are made. I'll let you know when I get there.
Patience, n. A minor form of despair, disguised as a virtue. ~Bierce
Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet. ~Rousseau
Endurance is patience concentrated. ~Carlyle
Are we there yet? ~Me
You're traveling through another dimension (am i? is that why i feel so distant and strange?) -- a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind (especially of mind dear god and boy, do i mind). A journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination (i certainly couldn't have imagined i'd be stretching my own boundaries so far). That's a signpost up ahead (shit. i hate the signs. i don't believe in signs... do i?). Your next stop: The Twilight Zone!
Please. That's not my next stop. I've been in this zone for quite some time now but it never becomes familiar. If and when it does, I'll know I've lost too much of myself to keep being who I think I am or I was.
I've been consciously waiting for things to change because the current situation is unacceptable as a status quo. I don't accept SNAFU as how it should be or how it will continue to be. What's keeping me going in this frozen state is that I'm sure (oh please oh please) it ends soon.
What's needing change, you ask? To be perfectly vague, I need my kid to be okay. His forced emotional state (damn you, justice, in the past) doesn't support that. In addition, I need to make this long distance epic (and I use that word in the old, non-commercially-abused sense) love into an in-our-face, right next to each other, stealing covers and putting the silverware in the wrong place in the tray, basking in each other's glow and glower and boredom and delight epic love. I need the courts to move forward. I need the government to move forward. I need my life to move forward.
Because this extended game intent on stalemate shit has got to go.
Every day and week and month and moment that passes in this swirly grey purgatory, this mundane but pregnant limbo, takes something out of me and replaces it with profound wisdom and, really, total shock at the way I'm handling these thumb screws. I'm losing my wonder but gaining strength. It's hard to think about because it hurts to accept the fact that I can't be both strong and bright (in my heart). As a little girl, even the smallest emotional slight tore my heart up. Now I feel like I'm staring at me from outside my body when broadsword blows to my emotional center barely rock me, let alone knock me off my feet. In the same way, music that moved me is now simply lovely but not profound. Clear, dark skies scattered with cold stars make me smile in a comfortable way but they don't take my breath or light me up with an electric glow anymore.
And that's okay, really. It's just sort of sad in a "yep, that's life" sort of way. It makes me think, though, about all the other people I know who have already done this growing up thing. All the roses with their bloom already off. I think I was a hold out. Maybe I was a late bloomer. Maybe I'm not a rose at all, but something slower and rarer like a night blooming desert flower. Or maybe I'm just getting older and the metaphors are naturally going towards the sun setting type.
So I'm in limbo and have been for a few years now. What am I learning from limbo? Well, I'm learning I can bend to a vulgar degree without breaking. I'm learning that fierce passion like mine can be concentrated and focused into slow burning fuel able to sustain my core through long winters of waiting.
I hate waiting. I'm also very good at it. I just didn't know that.
But now that I've had these revelations and revealed the center of my being, can we just get a move on?
No?
Okay. I'll be over here, reading all the magazines and having all the dreams and learning all the things until it's my turn to move forward. Just don't be surprised if I've rearranged the whole waiting room by the time you get to me. Because I'm here and I don't have a guide, I feel like I have a duty to future limbo dancers. I'll be leaving a map of waiting for the next poor, passionate soul. May they be as lucky as I am and have a stubborn fortitude and wells of patience and enough whimsy to make a life out of it as I have.
Either that or they can go quietly, artistically and positively mad. Which might be exactly what I'm doing. I think this is how eccentrics are made. I'll let you know when I get there.
Friday, October 25, 2013
Because I Can't Let it Go
Some weeks ago, I found myself engaged in a one-sided battle on my favourite social media site, Facebook. It was one-sided because all the pain the other person caused wasn't something I addressed. All I did was absorb it and hurt.
I did the unthinkable in public. I said I was tired and crabby. I said that about attending an event at my kid's school. Suddenly, I found myself wearing the frame of the portrait of the Not Good Enough Parent.
And it blew me away.
I wanted to stand in a room with the other person and download my whole experience as a mother, to have that person lay with me as I cried myself to sleep, to panic with me as I fell behind on bills, to sit with me as I scrabbled to keep my civility when my kid was being a (totally normal, totally within the average parameters and completely infuriating) jerk and I couldn't tell another soul to just "deal with it" while I hid in the other room with a good book. I had to stay Right There, mothering and Being Amazing and remembering all the Love & Logic training I had and not responding like any other human would... by ferociously barking.
You see, though I am in a serious (and amazing) relationship, I am functionally single. My mate, my partner, my other half is on the other side of the Atlantic ocean. We're four thousand, five hundred and two miles apart. Give or take a few yards. Or meters. Whatever. Somewhere out there, on the other side of a gigantic body of water filled with whales and sea cucumbers and darkness and rogue waves, is my support system. We don't exchange supportive looks across the room. He can't feel my temperature rising in ire, he can't take my kid for a man-to-man walk, he can't provide the third person perspective so agonizingly necessary in parenting.
Nor can my mate contribute to the household's finances. The money he budgets with barely covers his own basic needs. Thus, I'm on my own here. Not enough money for bills and groceries all in the same week? I weigh the priorities. I'm no longer growing. I can survive on my physical storage units (read that: my muscles because I'm already pretty skinny) in favour of supplying my offspring with the nourishment a kid needs during the adolescent growth spurt. I tell myself that I'm from pioneer stock. Before that, I'm from warriors. Between the bloodline of oxen crossed with Viking, I should be alright. Just don't ask me about my bone density. Or my teeth. Or my brain function when I'm faced with bouts of malnutrition. I get my nourishment from watching my son grow strong and healthy.
So, in being admonished for not being glitteringly grateful for every photographable, scrap book worthy and bragging rights firm event... I found myself utterly furious. I spent days examining the root cause of the fury and I came up with this: privilege. From a position of privilege, my exhaustion was being criticized.
And I realized it was bullshit.
Every night, I put my kid to bed with snuggles and assurances. I tell him to have sweet dreams and I tell him I love him and that I will do everything I can to make things be okay. Every morning, I wake him up with a silly story of "what is this chicken doing taking photographs" or "well, I'm sorry but I lost the car to a giraffe who wanted to drive to the Statue of Liberty. We're walking today." Every night, he snuggles down in his bed and tells me it is the safest, most wonderful place in the world. Every morning, he smiles himself awake and tells me I'm silly.
My son wakes up and goes to sleep feeling loved, secure and happy.
I can't make myself be grateful for every event. I can't see how other people with harder lives have more of a right to feel pain. I can't imagine telling another person that what is hard for them shouldn't be and that their struggle isn't valid. All I know is that I do the best I can and that my son feels safe. I see in his beautiful, content face that however I do this parenting thing, it's right. It's good. It's valid.
And I do judge the people who discount and belittle that. I do judge the privileged who dare to judge me. I swear on the contented, sleepy sighs of my kid that I will not do that to anyone else. I am a single mother of an amazing child. No matter how I do it, that my kid is doing alright is the only confirmation I need.
I did the unthinkable in public. I said I was tired and crabby. I said that about attending an event at my kid's school. Suddenly, I found myself wearing the frame of the portrait of the Not Good Enough Parent.
And it blew me away.
I wanted to stand in a room with the other person and download my whole experience as a mother, to have that person lay with me as I cried myself to sleep, to panic with me as I fell behind on bills, to sit with me as I scrabbled to keep my civility when my kid was being a (totally normal, totally within the average parameters and completely infuriating) jerk and I couldn't tell another soul to just "deal with it" while I hid in the other room with a good book. I had to stay Right There, mothering and Being Amazing and remembering all the Love & Logic training I had and not responding like any other human would... by ferociously barking.
You see, though I am in a serious (and amazing) relationship, I am functionally single. My mate, my partner, my other half is on the other side of the Atlantic ocean. We're four thousand, five hundred and two miles apart. Give or take a few yards. Or meters. Whatever. Somewhere out there, on the other side of a gigantic body of water filled with whales and sea cucumbers and darkness and rogue waves, is my support system. We don't exchange supportive looks across the room. He can't feel my temperature rising in ire, he can't take my kid for a man-to-man walk, he can't provide the third person perspective so agonizingly necessary in parenting.
Nor can my mate contribute to the household's finances. The money he budgets with barely covers his own basic needs. Thus, I'm on my own here. Not enough money for bills and groceries all in the same week? I weigh the priorities. I'm no longer growing. I can survive on my physical storage units (read that: my muscles because I'm already pretty skinny) in favour of supplying my offspring with the nourishment a kid needs during the adolescent growth spurt. I tell myself that I'm from pioneer stock. Before that, I'm from warriors. Between the bloodline of oxen crossed with Viking, I should be alright. Just don't ask me about my bone density. Or my teeth. Or my brain function when I'm faced with bouts of malnutrition. I get my nourishment from watching my son grow strong and healthy.
So, in being admonished for not being glitteringly grateful for every photographable, scrap book worthy and bragging rights firm event... I found myself utterly furious. I spent days examining the root cause of the fury and I came up with this: privilege. From a position of privilege, my exhaustion was being criticized.
And I realized it was bullshit.
Every night, I put my kid to bed with snuggles and assurances. I tell him to have sweet dreams and I tell him I love him and that I will do everything I can to make things be okay. Every morning, I wake him up with a silly story of "what is this chicken doing taking photographs" or "well, I'm sorry but I lost the car to a giraffe who wanted to drive to the Statue of Liberty. We're walking today." Every night, he snuggles down in his bed and tells me it is the safest, most wonderful place in the world. Every morning, he smiles himself awake and tells me I'm silly.
My son wakes up and goes to sleep feeling loved, secure and happy.
I can't make myself be grateful for every event. I can't see how other people with harder lives have more of a right to feel pain. I can't imagine telling another person that what is hard for them shouldn't be and that their struggle isn't valid. All I know is that I do the best I can and that my son feels safe. I see in his beautiful, content face that however I do this parenting thing, it's right. It's good. It's valid.
And I do judge the people who discount and belittle that. I do judge the privileged who dare to judge me. I swear on the contented, sleepy sighs of my kid that I will not do that to anyone else. I am a single mother of an amazing child. No matter how I do it, that my kid is doing alright is the only confirmation I need.
Saturday, October 12, 2013
On Pacifism, Compassion and Empathy
I was chatting with a friend yesterday who often doubts the things he is saying are valid. He never says, "I doubt the things I say are valid" in those words. He says it by apology, he says it in hesitance, he says it in ways that approach the fear from the side. By my observations, it's very, very common for people to apologize for their thoughts, to belittle themselves and to assume that they are somehow flawed or freakish for thinking as they do. But... if most people feel that way, then how can they be freakish? And how can I express to people that they're okay?
Thinking about this, I realized, in talking to him, what my whole purpose in life is. That's a pretty sizable revelation to have while sitting on your living room floor with a cat at your side and a cup of not very good coffee at hand. That's a pretty sizable revelation no matter what the circumstances. I was struck by the notion that here, in the midst of the mundane, I was being presented with one of those moments of clear vision.
My vision? Compassion. I'm here, on this planet and in this space, to be a vessel of compassion and to study the art of empathy. What I'm finding out about myself is stunning and I'm struck repeatedly by how difficult it is to maintain this kindness. Am I the first person to think this way? Not by a long shot. Will I be the last? Not hardly.
Let's take a moment to explore empathy and it's outward expression: pacifism. Pacifism isn't easy. It means I have to stop the up-rush of adrenaline that flows when someone says or does something hurtful. It means I have to bite my tongue. That hurts, both physically and emotionally, but the real kicker is that it doesn't injure. There's pain involved with turning the other cheek, taking a step back and a deep breath in, but there's no actual harm being done. To the contrary, the sharp sting of holding myself back results in non-injury.
I'm not talking about taking a physical swing at someone who's being a dick. I'm talking about reserving the sharp blades of my tongue and not taking a vicious bite out of the offending person's soul (soul? self-awareness? ego? whatever). Here, in my head and in my heart, I have this extraordinary ability to harm with words. My predilection for empathy means I have the ability to see and feel the very core fear of someone else and, if I choose, to use that fear and vulnerability as a point of attack.
I choose not to do that. I choose it all the time. I have the opportunity to strike out at that core in every person around me and I consciously choose not to do that. In my youth, I wielded that power a couple of times. I watched the people I turned my emotional violence on melt into fear and hurt. There were tears and there was begging and there was, born of my cruelty, a real hate lit up in them. I think I caused lifetime scars. I know I scarred myself.
I look back on those times and I find my only true regrets. I am ashamed of the pain I inflicted, but there isn't a thing I can do about it now but remember and (try!!) never do it again. Not even when it seems like the smart option. Not even when it seems like the only option. Seems like. Appears to be.
It isn't. There's always another way to deal with someone else's bad behaviour.
That's pacifism. As much as I want to berate, belittle and browbeat folks from time to time, I don't do it. Why? Because every single person out there feels like my friend. Strange. Apologetic. Wrong. Vulnerable. I don't need to add to that. I don't need to carve the foundation out from someone because they are, quite likely, already doing that to themselves.
Does that mean I'm going to smile and nod and agree with everything other people have to say? Oh my, no. Does it mean that I won't stand my ground, discuss uncomfortable things, point out flaws and dickish behaviour? No. It means that when I do stand my ground, I do so from a position of realizing that every person comes to conclusions based on the information they have and experiences they've lived through. Including me. It means I have to remember (I choose to remember) to accept that everyone has the same motivation: doing the right thing. It doesn't matter if they're doing the right thing for themselves, doing the right thing for all beings, doing the right thing for their church, doing the right thing for a reward or doing the right thing because their heart tells them so. They are all acting on the premise that what they are doing is the right thing.
Because of that, and because I seek to be a better person than I am right now, I'm choosing to use my empathy in a loving way. I'm going to love even when I'm so pissed off I can hardly see straight. I'm going to love enough to think through my anger and respond to dickish behaviour with strength and compassion. I'm going to love each person enough not to go for the emotional jugular, even when they go for mine. Pacifism, to me, is about strength and balance, mercy and mindfulness. Pacifism is about having the courage to weather my own anger long enough to come out the other side and recognize that the other person in front of me is worthy of love.
I can't fix fear with fear. I can't fight hate with hate. I can only apply more love.
I'm willing to do that. For everyone.
Thinking about this, I realized, in talking to him, what my whole purpose in life is. That's a pretty sizable revelation to have while sitting on your living room floor with a cat at your side and a cup of not very good coffee at hand. That's a pretty sizable revelation no matter what the circumstances. I was struck by the notion that here, in the midst of the mundane, I was being presented with one of those moments of clear vision.
My vision? Compassion. I'm here, on this planet and in this space, to be a vessel of compassion and to study the art of empathy. What I'm finding out about myself is stunning and I'm struck repeatedly by how difficult it is to maintain this kindness. Am I the first person to think this way? Not by a long shot. Will I be the last? Not hardly.
Let's take a moment to explore empathy and it's outward expression: pacifism. Pacifism isn't easy. It means I have to stop the up-rush of adrenaline that flows when someone says or does something hurtful. It means I have to bite my tongue. That hurts, both physically and emotionally, but the real kicker is that it doesn't injure. There's pain involved with turning the other cheek, taking a step back and a deep breath in, but there's no actual harm being done. To the contrary, the sharp sting of holding myself back results in non-injury.
I'm not talking about taking a physical swing at someone who's being a dick. I'm talking about reserving the sharp blades of my tongue and not taking a vicious bite out of the offending person's soul (soul? self-awareness? ego? whatever). Here, in my head and in my heart, I have this extraordinary ability to harm with words. My predilection for empathy means I have the ability to see and feel the very core fear of someone else and, if I choose, to use that fear and vulnerability as a point of attack.
I choose not to do that. I choose it all the time. I have the opportunity to strike out at that core in every person around me and I consciously choose not to do that. In my youth, I wielded that power a couple of times. I watched the people I turned my emotional violence on melt into fear and hurt. There were tears and there was begging and there was, born of my cruelty, a real hate lit up in them. I think I caused lifetime scars. I know I scarred myself.
I look back on those times and I find my only true regrets. I am ashamed of the pain I inflicted, but there isn't a thing I can do about it now but remember and (try!!) never do it again. Not even when it seems like the smart option. Not even when it seems like the only option. Seems like. Appears to be.
It isn't. There's always another way to deal with someone else's bad behaviour.
That's pacifism. As much as I want to berate, belittle and browbeat folks from time to time, I don't do it. Why? Because every single person out there feels like my friend. Strange. Apologetic. Wrong. Vulnerable. I don't need to add to that. I don't need to carve the foundation out from someone because they are, quite likely, already doing that to themselves.
Does that mean I'm going to smile and nod and agree with everything other people have to say? Oh my, no. Does it mean that I won't stand my ground, discuss uncomfortable things, point out flaws and dickish behaviour? No. It means that when I do stand my ground, I do so from a position of realizing that every person comes to conclusions based on the information they have and experiences they've lived through. Including me. It means I have to remember (I choose to remember) to accept that everyone has the same motivation: doing the right thing. It doesn't matter if they're doing the right thing for themselves, doing the right thing for all beings, doing the right thing for their church, doing the right thing for a reward or doing the right thing because their heart tells them so. They are all acting on the premise that what they are doing is the right thing.
Because of that, and because I seek to be a better person than I am right now, I'm choosing to use my empathy in a loving way. I'm going to love even when I'm so pissed off I can hardly see straight. I'm going to love enough to think through my anger and respond to dickish behaviour with strength and compassion. I'm going to love each person enough not to go for the emotional jugular, even when they go for mine. Pacifism, to me, is about strength and balance, mercy and mindfulness. Pacifism is about having the courage to weather my own anger long enough to come out the other side and recognize that the other person in front of me is worthy of love.
I can't fix fear with fear. I can't fight hate with hate. I can only apply more love.
I'm willing to do that. For everyone.
Friday, September 27, 2013
So Passes the Time
It has been a year since I spoke here.
For a full year, I've been wary of words written in electronic space. For a year, I've been occupied elsewhere, still full of thoughts but hesitant to express them. The reasons why are a different story altogether, and not one I'm willing to share just now.
It is the end of easy. Summer has gone and the winds are coming out of the north, stiffening flags and tearing leaves from trees. As the seasons change, so do the concerns. My birthday is fast approaching and I'm forced to consider my mortality and my obligation to the world. I think, therefore I am. I am, therefore I must think.
What do I think about? Life choices. I realized not so long ago that by default, I've made food service my career. This isn't to say that I can't up and choose a new path but in the current atmosphere, that seems unwise.
So, given that I've chosen food service (whether by accident or by design I don't know), I've been thinking that I might share what I know in the context of servings and service, behaviour and appetite, expectation and nuance.
First of all, I know that most people have no idea what they're doing if it involves more than the daily grind. No one seems to know which fork to use. They know they need to be up at 7 and back from lunch at one. They don't know if they're allowed to use teeth when they smile or what words to use in asking where the bathroom is. They don't know that, aside from the rare unincorporated (socially) individual, they all make the same faces that imply the same questions. People who walk in the door expecting to meet other people have a look. People looking for that bathroom have a look. People who come to pick up take-out orders have a look.
In those looks, they look the same.
Bathroom people. You have a faraway, distracted and urgent look. Take-away people, you have a near-sighted and purposeful look. Those meeting others, you don't see what's right in front of you. You're looking into a vague want.
It's amazing.
It makes me think. If we're that predictable about something as simple as enjoying the privilege of eating outside our home (and, if you'll grant me this assumption, there's not a whole lot of survivalist pressure there), what common looks do we have for the bigger things in life? People who have survived war. People whose parents did, inasmuch, torture them. People who can't stand themselves. People who can't see anyone but themselves. You all, in your struggle, have the same tenseness of mouth, you share a focal point, you hold your bodies at the same angle.
Because of my years and years of service to the public, I can see you coming from quite a distance. All of you.
And that's the crux, isn't it? We're all hiding our fears, our weaknesses, our trepidation about what others think. The last thing we want is for someone to see us. To really see us and judge us unworthy.
What makes me sad is that each and every one of us seems to expect that these so-called flaws are going to make others think we are weak or not as valuable or suspect in some way. But, when you consider that every single person you meet or interact with or pass by on the street is afraid and vulnerable in some way... you've got to realize that it is our individual struggle that makes us so able to attach to each other.
So you picked up the wrong fork. I've done that. So you stumbled right to pass someone instead of left. I've done that. So you were embarrassed to ask where the bathroom is because I might know you need to use the bathroom. I've done that. We have all done that. We are all vulnerable. We are all flawed. We are all afraid.
The reservations you make with me for parties of five are actually reservations of asking to be allowed to be who you are. And I'm going to honour them. I will save you a place in this construct. I will help you find your way. I will ease your confusion with grace.
All I ask is that you accept this grace and sometimes return my kindness with some of your own. I need it as much as you do; as much as every one of us does. I thank you in advance for your mercy and I tell you that you are always welcome to mine.
For a full year, I've been wary of words written in electronic space. For a year, I've been occupied elsewhere, still full of thoughts but hesitant to express them. The reasons why are a different story altogether, and not one I'm willing to share just now.
It is the end of easy. Summer has gone and the winds are coming out of the north, stiffening flags and tearing leaves from trees. As the seasons change, so do the concerns. My birthday is fast approaching and I'm forced to consider my mortality and my obligation to the world. I think, therefore I am. I am, therefore I must think.
What do I think about? Life choices. I realized not so long ago that by default, I've made food service my career. This isn't to say that I can't up and choose a new path but in the current atmosphere, that seems unwise.
So, given that I've chosen food service (whether by accident or by design I don't know), I've been thinking that I might share what I know in the context of servings and service, behaviour and appetite, expectation and nuance.
First of all, I know that most people have no idea what they're doing if it involves more than the daily grind. No one seems to know which fork to use. They know they need to be up at 7 and back from lunch at one. They don't know if they're allowed to use teeth when they smile or what words to use in asking where the bathroom is. They don't know that, aside from the rare unincorporated (socially) individual, they all make the same faces that imply the same questions. People who walk in the door expecting to meet other people have a look. People looking for that bathroom have a look. People who come to pick up take-out orders have a look.
In those looks, they look the same.
Bathroom people. You have a faraway, distracted and urgent look. Take-away people, you have a near-sighted and purposeful look. Those meeting others, you don't see what's right in front of you. You're looking into a vague want.
It's amazing.
It makes me think. If we're that predictable about something as simple as enjoying the privilege of eating outside our home (and, if you'll grant me this assumption, there's not a whole lot of survivalist pressure there), what common looks do we have for the bigger things in life? People who have survived war. People whose parents did, inasmuch, torture them. People who can't stand themselves. People who can't see anyone but themselves. You all, in your struggle, have the same tenseness of mouth, you share a focal point, you hold your bodies at the same angle.
Because of my years and years of service to the public, I can see you coming from quite a distance. All of you.
And that's the crux, isn't it? We're all hiding our fears, our weaknesses, our trepidation about what others think. The last thing we want is for someone to see us. To really see us and judge us unworthy.
What makes me sad is that each and every one of us seems to expect that these so-called flaws are going to make others think we are weak or not as valuable or suspect in some way. But, when you consider that every single person you meet or interact with or pass by on the street is afraid and vulnerable in some way... you've got to realize that it is our individual struggle that makes us so able to attach to each other.
So you picked up the wrong fork. I've done that. So you stumbled right to pass someone instead of left. I've done that. So you were embarrassed to ask where the bathroom is because I might know you need to use the bathroom. I've done that. We have all done that. We are all vulnerable. We are all flawed. We are all afraid.
The reservations you make with me for parties of five are actually reservations of asking to be allowed to be who you are. And I'm going to honour them. I will save you a place in this construct. I will help you find your way. I will ease your confusion with grace.
All I ask is that you accept this grace and sometimes return my kindness with some of your own. I need it as much as you do; as much as every one of us does. I thank you in advance for your mercy and I tell you that you are always welcome to mine.
Monday, August 20, 2012
Damn you, Mr. Akin.
On gender and inequality: theoretical causality and consequence.
Translation? Why the hell are women still considered the weaker/lesser sex and what the hell does this mean to me as a woman. I don't know why we are, but I'll tell you what it means to me.
It means that no matter how much personal and physical power I have, no matter my training or available weaponry, I am (at best) skittish about going to a restroom in a public place by myself.
Why? Because if you match my skeletal frame exactly with a male of my species, by evolution and physics alone and by (dis)virtue of my reproductive system being the receiving vessel, I am vulnerable to rape. I don't need an erection to have sex. I only need to be there. My muscles and my tendons and my bone density are lighter than my male counterpart. I. Am. Vulnerable. And when you look at the statistics of 1 in 5 women having been sexually assaulted, it should be clear that my fear (and my entire gender's fear) of attack are not only well founded but wise.
That sucks. It's horrible but I live with it and in it and I hope I never again have to process an incident of sexual assault in my life. Still, I live. I live cautiously and carefully and nearly always on guard.
Times like these, when elected or elect-hopeful people start messing with the nuances and wording of legal rape and the means by which the survivors deal with the consequences (pregnancy), I get frightened. Not only do I have to consider how to survive a possible future attack, I also have to consider how to deal with the aftermath.
Tell you what: the week following an attack is hell. The months following are horrific no matter whether you are single or involved in a relationship. In a relationship, the one you love cannot touch you without triggering a body memory and reams of guilt and emotional anguish come pouring out of you and spill all over everything. Ruby Red Squirt (a soda pop that i don't even know if still exists) makes me dizzy and start to gag. So does a certain kind of curtain. A certain posture or body type of a man. Specific types of blades. Scents. Seasonal light in the evening. Architectural design of hallways. Triggers exist all over, but at least I know they are specific and rooted in the past.
However, every time some bastard in Congress or on his/her way there starts to mess with my ability to feel safe (relatively speaking) and I see the masses of support for this sort of thinking, I am drawn inevitably back to frightened for myself and for every other potential victim out there. These are broad stroke triggers. Because every dig at my freedom and pursuit of happiness shakes the foundations that suffragette sisters over human history have fought (and been brutalized) for. Every thoughtless action being leveraged into law sends a clear and awful message to the constituents. Somehow, somewhere, it's okay to belittle and objectify women. The more we become objects, the less hesitance people have to feel about marginalizing us.
Women's wages tell us we can be marginalized. Our frequency (or lack thereof) in positions of power, our still accepted traditional roles as workhorses and doormats, the multiple states that have made medical rape both acceptable and required, and this old but new again rhetoric that we, as women, cannot be trusted or allowed to make decisions about the only thing we have that will ever really be ours... our bodies... tells me loud and clear and threatening: You Are Not Worthy of all the human rights; therefore, you are not fully human. You're not as human as some other humans. Two legs, good. Two legs and a dick, better.
Are they honestly trying to tell me that muscle power and a penis are the qualifiers of a worthy person?
Wow.
How some folks wonder why I would take such offense to that notion both baffles and infuriates me. Do I think all men believe this? Not by a long shot. Do I think it's only men who think this? Not hardly. Do I intend to sit all quiet and nice while someone else attacks my freedom? No.
No, I do not.
And, as ever, NO MEANS NO.
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