Affirmation

We are the invisible.
Who will look at us and see?
We are the inaudible.
Will you listen to what we have to say?
We are the untouchable.
Who will hold us in their heart?

I see what's been hidden.
You are not invisible to me.
I hear the things you cannot say.
I will listen.
Your pain is in my heart.
I will hold you there.

An Apparently Unpopular Opinion

   Am I the only one who is having trouble with something that keeps cropping up as I listen to coverage  and discussion of the recent elementary school shootings in Newtown, CT? I hear reference most often to 26 victims that day or that something is being done 26 times, once for each victim of the Newtown shootings, and I always think that surely most people can understand there were at least 27 victims. It's like those making public statements and leading public actions are so afraid of potentially offending others they aren't willing to openly acknowledge the gunman's mother as one of the victims, and I find that sad. No matter how much we love to find someone to blame when things go wrong, and no matter how much we love to blame parents for any inappropriate behavior exhibited by the children they raise, the woman was shot while in bed and had, by all reports, been trying hard in the ways she knew how to help her troubled son, so why are so many unwilling to count her among the victims that day?
   And to completely out myself for the bleeding heart type that I am, I actually count 28 victims killed in Newtown on December 14th. To me, the young man who killed so many before turning the gun on himself was the 28th. Whether you consider that he was a victim of mental illness that took a chance at a normal life away from him, a victim of others' lack of empathy and/or understanding that could have helped him before he got to such a dark and hopeless place inside, or just a victim of the gunshot that took his life away, he was also a victim according to this Merriam-Webster.com definition: a (1) : one that is injured, destroyed, or sacrificed under any of various conditions <a victim of cancer> <a victim of the auto crash> <a murder victim>. 
   Truly, when you consider how a small deviation in our delicate brain chemistry can create such inability to perceive the things around is in a realistic way or to connect with others and even our own emotions, each of us should be able to look at an Adam Lanza and say, "There, but for the grace of God, go I," feeling compassion for the awful pain he most have been in while absolutely deploring the action he chose to take in his attempts to alleviate that pain. If we let ourselves be hardened to our fellow humans' pain of any sort, we are letting the best part of our humanity become another victim of the Sandy Hook shootings.
   

All I Got Is Love

   It will take quite a while for most of us to process yesterday's terrible tragedy, the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT. There's a lot of information and misinformation flying around the internet and there will be a lot of discussion as facts surface in the investigation as to what exactly happened and why, and what we can learn from it, and what can we do to prevent such things in the future.
   I'm following the story and taking in the information as it comes out and trying to process it intellectually and emotionally. Frankly, it's really tough. It's an awful thing to read about and think about and feel about. It makes me cry at times and it makes me feel physically ill at times, imagining what happened and how all the innocent victims felt and thought in their last seconds.
   I have no real answers as to what we can do to prevent future tragedies, but I do have a personal philosophy that gets stronger every year as to how we who care can make a difference: all we got is love. In the fight against evil and darkness on the earth, our most powerful weapon is love. If we can feel love for and act in a loving way toward those we encounter in our daily lives; if we can swallow our own self-importance enough to remember we have no idea what the other person is going through or feeling that makes them act the way they do and say the things they say and have compassion for those who are hurting so badly they lash out at others - while maintaining enough love for ourselves we don't remain in a situation that is damaging to us; if we can choose certain loving actions we can make a part of our routine, like volunteer work that helps others less fortunate than ourselves or regularly taking the time to check in with people we know who are on the fringes of society and may not have a good support system in place, then we are doing our part to prevent senseless tragedy. The power of our love can help feed the spark of caring and humanity in others we encounter and the resulting blaze will overcome the power of darkness in the end. And I know it can happen. After all, someone much wiser than me tells us in the Bible at Romans 12:21, "Do not let yourself be conquered by the evil, but keep conquering the evil with the good."

Back Off, People!

    If you knew a person who was in a terrible accident as a child and lost a limb as a result, would you badger them to work hard to attempt to grow that limb back? Even if you believed they're such a nice person they really deserve to have the use of all their appendages? Even if you were convinced there had to be some way if they would just try hard enough? Would you really presume you knew better than they how they should allot their resources and align their priorities in their life? ...I didn't think so.

Reconstruction?

I'm poking around this cavity
In moments of fun, and gravity
Examining all that's not here
Taking readings of the atmosphere
Carefully studying the empty space
Conjecturing what would fill its place
Tracing the shapes made in the air
So, finally, I can see the chair
Trying to define what I've never had

Watching the amputee slipping on scrim
Can you envision the missing limb?
Born deaf and still attempting to sing
Will anyone listen to such a thing?
The sightless artist painting the sky
What strokes does he make? and moreover, why?
Born with the capacity for faith and trust
How to rebuild what's crumbled to dust?
A person I would want to call "Dad"

self sabotage

strange how
a place can be
so familiar
and yet
so hard to recognize
each step of the journey
each time
you return

Overachieving

   An interesting thing happened to me on my way to work this past summer. I was driving on a back road and I could see a couple of people and a dog walking down the road in my direction. The dog wasn't on a leash and it broke away from its people and started jogging toward me. It seemed that the people tried to call the dog back, but it was more interested in my car than whatever they were saying.
   As the dog came closer, I slowed down so as not to run into it if it made an unexpected movement. It stopped right in the middle of the dirt road, so I also stopped, rolled down my window and told it that my car was much bigger than it and it could get hurt if it stayed there. At this point, the people accompanying the dog were probably no more than 30 yards away so I just sat and waited for them to come retrieve it. I wasn't having the greatest morning, was already late to work, and really didn't want to hit a dog, even at a very slow speed, to make my day even more stressful. I was feeling pretty good about how responsible and patient I was being despite their obvious delinquency as dog owners in not keeping their animal out of my path as I waited for the woman to reach her dog.
    Imagine, then, my surprise when the woman (who looked a lot like a shorter version of Katherine Hepburn) approached my rolled down window and kindly but firmly said to me, "You need to learn something." She went on to tell me that when this dog, or any dog, was in the road, I needed to keep on driving. According to her, the dog had been encouraged in this bad habit by people like me who stopped to talk to him or even feed him treats when he was in the way of their cars and that's why he kept getting in the way. I was just reinforcing bad behavior by stopping my car. She seemed set to lecture all day (I found out later she was probably a retired teacher) so I did my best to draw the one-sided conversation to a quick conclusion by acting interested in what she had to say and then taking the first opportunity I got to thank her for the information and wish her a good day.
    As I got to work and set up for the day, my mind kept returning to this incident. I could see the point in what the woman was saying but couldn't help but feel rather annoyed at the way she let her dog do whatever it wanted, then chastised me, a person who didn't know this particular dog and had been inconvenienced on my way to work by its actions, for my 'enabling' behavior! I couldn't quite decide whether to laugh it off or give her a piece of my mind if I ever ran into them again.
    And then I realized what about the experience kept me mulling it over and what my attitude about it would gel into. I thought to myself: is it harder to train unwanted behavior out of one animal that you have contact with every day, feed, groom, take care of it it gets hurt or sick, and, presumably, inspire affection and a desire to please you in, or to undertake to train a wanted behavior into hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of previously unknown drivers you will encounter when you are walking said animal on the back roads of a small community over its lifetime? It absolutely boggled my mind to imagine the amount of determination and confidence that could cause a person to prefer to undertake the latter task! And I decided that that woman is the best definition of an overachiever I've run into in a long time.

Peerless

Billions of people
yet not one your exact match
feeling special now? :)

Yup!

I Don't Know

Catch me when I fall
Answer when I call
Do you hear me? Do you care?
Let me know that I am real
That you know how much I feel
For something that's not even there
Did you think we would always be together?
That your loving could shelter me forever?
There's so much you don't know you don't know

Tell me you're still waiting
Still anticipating
It's not true we both know
Hold me as I cry
Look me in the eye
And say "hello", as you go
Did you think those mixed messages you're sending
Won't tell me we've lost our happy ending?
There's so much that I know you don't know

Now comes the part I feared as I tried to keep you near
We're all scared of what we can't see
I was clinging to that ledge as we teetered on the edge
If  I fell now I might land right smack in me!

Catch me when I fall
Answer when I call
Who will hear me? Who will care?
I think that I'm still real. I know how much I feel
I will find me. I'll be there
Did I think I could hide away forever?
I just can't be that strong - or that clever!
There's so much that I know I don't know
There's so much that I know I don't know

Haiku

thoughts whirl in and out
feelings follow up and down
breathe deep. life will be

Ya Know?

     There are different ways of knowing things. In thinking it over, I've identified three. First is an intellectual knowing of a thing you've read or heard about or observed (like a science experiment). This might be termed "head knowing". Next is a knowing in the gut, an intuition. This occurs when a person decides to change their plans because they just "know" something bad is going to happen. And sure enough, something does happen to their original flight or along their intended route, or what have you. People who believe they fell in love at first sight are also trusting in this "gut knowing". The third type of knowing is what I call "heart knowing". This likely takes some time and experience of a person or situation to develop. An example of this type of knowing is when it looks as if a man has committed a crime, but his wife (or mother...or friend...or child...) knows he's not the sort of person to do such a thing and maintains his innocence even after he is convicted. Then one day it becomes possible to use DNA evidence to prove his innocence and he is released. Sometimes heart knowledge doesn't agree with head knowledge, but that doesn't mean it's wrong. At times it may be in our best interest to believe in something that can't be proven.
     Then I realized that if there are these different ways of knowing, there are different ways of being known, as well. Many grown people are most comfortable with being known primarily on an intellectual level. They like to talk and be listened to, because that gives them more control over what others think of them, or how others "know" them. Gut knowledge no one has much control over, though I suppose a person might do their best to look good, being clean and well-groomed and dressing neatly, in an effort to offset any negative impact we might unwittingly have on others' intuition. If we are very comfortable with the people we are with, we may be able to still our intellect enough to get to know them with our heart, to feel the essence of the person they are and let them see the unedited version of us, the one we're usually trying to put a spin on in our dealings with other people. Young children are still skilled at knowing and being known with the heart, probably because they have little experience with life and so don't feel scared yet to let others be close to them.
     You likely know of other types of knowing I didn't think of, but these are the ones that I know make sense. I know all three of these kinds of knowledge are useful to us. We just need to know how to listen to and for each kind and to know which one is best to trust in in each instance. And that kind of knowledge probably comes from a blend of all three (or more) types of knowing. Do you know what I mean?
   

The Grass Is Always On the Wrong Side of the Fence?

     Some people seem to never be satisfied in life. Whatever they have, they wish they had something newer, bigger, faster, better. Wherever they are, they wish they were somewhere else. Whoever they're with, they wish they were with someone more perfect (like themselves, presumably). I could go on and on.   
     Of course, this attitude is encouraged by the advertising industry. We are inundated with messages (some subtle, some not-so) designed to make us feel like we need the newest, biggest, most complex, etc., of whatever is on the market. No matter how determined I am to enjoy the moment and be satisfied with what I have, it can be hard to resist all the alluring images of tropical vacations and shiny new electronics! And our cultural attitude that we deserve to be blissfully happy at all times makes it very hard to be patient with the flaws, real or perceived, of those around us. Not to mention how the increasing stress of being patient and polite with an ever-increasing circle of persons at work, at school, on the road, in stores, online, brings us home with less and less self-control with which to use those qualities on our nearest and dearest. Rather than realizing that the fault lies in our own thinking and behavior, we can easily begin to believe we would be happier with a different partner, parent, child, sibling, roommate, even pet! The promise of a quick fix for our dissatisfaction by jettisoning the old, with its known flaws, to make way for the intriguing new can be so enticing.
     Unfortunately, once we get to know whatever new person, place or thing we thought would make us ecstatically joyful all the time, we see it also has its own set of imperfections. And we have to decide whether we need to make a switch again or find ways to be content with the circumstances we are in now.
     Now, my philosophy tends to be, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it!" And I can make a pretty good case for the position that this is morally superior to continually needing/wanting something newer and better. But if I'm honest with myself I have to admit my attitude stems at least partly from a bit of laziness on my part. It takes work to make an informed choice when replacing a new item. It takes work to go looking for a new job. It takes work to move to a new area. And it takes a lot of work to get to know a new person in any sort of close relationship! So why not just stick with what you have and tell yourself it's because you are a "better" person than those who go job hopping around the continent or have to trade in whatever they have for the latest model each time it comes out?
     Sadly (for my desire to remain in my comfort zone), I also am fairly committed to trying to be honest with myself. And sometimes a change is the best thing for ourselves and those around us. Sometimes we or the job have grown and/or changed to the point that we are no longer a good fit. Sometimes a person we meet is so worth our spending time and effort in getting to know them better. Sometimes we need to move out of our parents' basement before we're retired and sitting down there all day long! And sometimes that twenty-year-old car would be better off at the parts yard and we would be better off with a cute little Kia wagon and a small loan, establishing a credit history and spending less time waiting by the side of the road for a tow truck.

Makes Me Think Again

     It's been kind of a tough winter for me this year, and I've been feeling rather sorry for myself at times! Then I found this:

   Puts my problems in perspective! I hope it does the same for you :)

Chef Soup

In honor of the new Muppet movie, the youngest child's newly discovered soup-making skills, the middle one's vegetarian leanings, the eldest's work helping to prepare delicious-looking food at Lake Avenue Cafe... and reptiles, of course!

Richness

     I woke up this morning and moved quietly around the house for an hour or so, so as not to disturb them too early. Now the eldest has left on a coffee run, the youngest is in the shower, the middle one is still slumbering after meeting with friends last night, and bacon and waffles are cooking in the kitchen. I may not have a lot materially, but I feel like the richest woman in the world when all my children are home!

Peace, Pieces!

All the little pieces
Scattered 'round the floor
Stoop to pick a couple up
There's a couple more

Gather up the pieces
Put them in the box
Here's a bit of ocean
Here's part of the rocks

Peer under the sofa
Reach behind the door
How did this one end up here?
What is that one for?

Sifting, sorting, the multicolored throng
Weighing, wondering, does this one belong?

Many of these pieces
Don't quite seem to fit
And I find I don't feel sure
I'll ever finish it

Trying to piece together
A complete, finished frame
To hang the middle off of
But nothing looks the same

And so I have a bit of sea
Another bit of sky
Some houses here, some beetles there
An eagle perched up high

Weighing, wondering about the parts I see
Placing, piecing all the parts of me

Make War, Not Love

     I've always thought of myself as a pacifist and been unsure I could kill someone, even to save my life, though I am pretty sure I could do it to save one of my children. I've always played a good defensive game of chess, but been unable to figure out how to win the game, except by accident! And I've been sure for years those two facts are related in some way, but until recently didn't think it was worth bothering to figure out how.
     But "the times, they are a-changin'." (Never thought I'd be quoting Dylan on this blog! Now I need The Mike to do his impression for me.)
     Years ago, I went to a cooperative games night at the kids' elementary school. One of the games we played  involved breaking the players up into two equal groups, putting one group on either side of a line down the middle of the room, and giving each group an equal number of small, soft balls. The object of the game was to become the group with no balls on your side of the line.
     Of course, as soon as the game started people on both sides started throwing balls like crazy, trying to get them all onto the other side of the line, and it immediately became apparent that wasn't the way to win anything. As I watched, I couldn't see any way all the balls could end up on one side of the line, because they were continually being thrown and returned, and if one side hung on to all of them, thinking they would then throw them all over to the other side at once, they would lose the game while they were stockpiling for that final throw. But I did think of a way both sides could win at the same time.
     So I consulted with a few people on my team. They agreed it was worth a try, and we told our plan to our other teammates. Then we called a couple of our opponents to the center to see if they wanted to put the plan into action. They did, so they spread the word to their teammates. Then players on both sides grabbed the nearest ball and hung onto it. Everyone who had a ball came to the center line and, on the count of three, placed their ball on the line, meaning neither side had any balls on it and so both teams won at the same time. Or at least, that was the way the plan was supposed to work. What actually happened was that one of the mothers on my team had a ball in her pocket and once all the other balls were on the line she threw it onto the other side, thinking we won the game without even considering we actually lost it while the ball was in her pocket! By which action she showed herself to be stupid as well as an uncooperative cheater and bad example for all the children present. But that has nothing to do with my point. My point is: I thought of a way for both sides to win the game. Yay!
     But I've always wondered if there was a way for only one side to win the game that I just couldn't see. So recently I asked my facebook contacts if anyone could come up with an answer to that problem. Almost immediately, one of my friends responded with this solution: have one team member unobtrusively hold a ball over the line while the rest of your team holds onto the balls that are being frantically thrown at you. Then at the count of three everyone, including the sneaky over-the-line ball holder, can throw or drop the ball they're holding on the other side of the line and your team will win the game outright. Simple, right? But I never thought of it whenever I remembered that game over the years.
     Which brings me back to the facts that I don't think I could ever kill someone, even to save my own life, and I can't seem to play a winning game of chess. And I figured out these facts are related by the sad truth that I have no offense. My life plan has always been to seek cooperation from others and try to find ways everybody can be happy.
     Now this is fine for many, maybe even most, situations in life. But it occurred to me as I was pondering these things that there will be times when you just can't get cooperation from the people around you, and the stakes will be important enough that you have to try to win - like if someone really is trying to kill you, or if there's only one chocolate left in the box. So you have to develop some offensive strategy to the best of your ability. And maybe it's okay if everybody doesn't end up happy when one of the everybodies involved just wants to kill another of the everybodies, or neither body is willing to split the last coconut cream chocolate. So I'm thinking of changing my philosophy to generally pacifistic but ready to fight when I believe the situation justifies it. And I hope this will make everybody happy ;)

Choice and Commitment

      This post is dedicated to my family of origin, who have taught me more than they know on the subject. I'm sure they would return the compliment!
    
     When you're a teenager and young adult, it's easy to imagine each new friendship and relationship is going to always be as great as it feels at the heady start, the getting-to-know-how-wonderful-each-other-is phase, and will last forever at this same giddy level of interest and interaction. This is a good thing for a young person who is at the individuating stage of development, beginning to make your own way in the world as a separate entity from your parents and family. After all, if you didn't have hope there was something much better out there than what you already know, how many of us would actually take the leap to move out on our own or with roommates? And even more important for the continuation of the human race, how many would take the gigantic leap of joining our self and our future to another person in marriage, to become one and raise new little individuators? There's a reason why someone coined the phrase, "Better the devil you know than the devil you don't," after all! We tend to be a little afraid, or at least cautious, of the unknown and so a good, healthy dose of denial and self-deception can get us over that threshold we might never cross otherwise.
     As time goes by, however, we begin to notice little imperfections in our chosen friends and loved ones: they're always running a bit late and so we're always sitting waiting for them; or maybe they have an annoying laugh that begins to grate on our nerves after hearing it thousands of times; or they don't manage money as carefully as we would like them to; or they don't like to try new cuisines and foods the way we do; or maybe they just don't know the new roll of toilet paper should be loaded so the end hangs over the roll, not under, darnit! (It is ridiculous what some parents don't teach their children!) And when we notice these imperfections, whether consciously or not, we're evaluating whether this is a trait or behavior we can continue to tolerate in the long term.
     If we are committed to the relationship, we are determined to find ways to tolerate the other person's faults and foibles so we can continue to enjoy each other's company. We may talk to them about what's bothering us and ask for improvement on their part, or we may develop coping mechanisms to block out unpleasant habits, or we may start drinking heavily - whatever helps us through. And if our friend or partner is also committed to the relationship, they'll probably try to make the changes we ask for. They may even have to develop coping mechanisms of their own to deal with our (surely imagined) annoying traits and habits! And so, if both parties feel a strong level of commitment to keeping the connection, a good relationship can grow and flourish over the years until we know the other person almost as well as we know our self and feel secure that we'll always be there for each other.
     Eventually, we find a strange thing has occurred. The wonderful, perfect person we originally were drawn to, the one we decided we would always need in our life as a friend or lover, has become just as flawed and annoying and familiar-feeling and intrinsic to our life as those people we grew up with and left behind so long ago when we were beginning to make our own place in the world. Through our strong sense of commitment that kept us going through any disillusionment along the way, we have turned them into family, a family we chose for ourselves.
     But what's even more strange is how our original family, people who - with the exception of the married couples contained in it - never chose each other and may not even have chosen each other if they didn't share genes, have always been there for us over the years as we went through the process of becoming an individual in the world and choosing other individuals as friends and family and sharing and surviving and negotiating so many experiences over the years! True, not all family members stay close, or even in touch, but most do try to help and support and share with each other. And that's a pretty amazing level of commitment to someone you had no choice at all about, so this family thing is a pretty amazing invention despite the misunderstandings and pain and fear and frustration that come with close human relationships. Though sometimes, if the frustrations are too great, it leads to some of us being committed in a different way, but that's a subject for another post!
                  

Creation

Swirling mass of chaos
Thickly clouding my perceptions
Makes it hard to
See what to do
How to achieve my goals

Forced sensory overload
All the needs and wants and fears
How did you get
Inside my head?
You don't belong to me

Turn attention inward
Take deep breaths and settle down
This work is mine
My chance to shine
Let's take it seriously

Push and pull, stop to ponder
Now the vision's growing stronger
Stretch here, smoosh there
This should go where?
Reflecting my reality

Bring the inside outward
Allow the outside inward
Fold in neatly
Blend completely
See sky while feeling earth

Angst and sweat and toil are past
Here's the vision brought to life
Look here by me
Now do you see
All I meant to say?

Have I finished now?
Can I say I made this?
Contemplate it
Rest for a bit
Tomorrow's another day