Wednesday, February 17, 2016
Tuesday, January 19, 2016
20/20
Dear Camble,
"I'm not crying for me." The most uncomfortable and inspiring words I've heard, Buddy.
When it is tempting to lose my kindness I am reminded of the compassion you exemplify. When the boy at wrestling practice slapped you across the face last week and called you names for not going along with doing something your Dad told you not to be doing, you couldn't explain the embarassment and tears. I get it Camble. I finally get it. It's your life and your struggles and we're certainly struggling and hoping for you too, but the biggest struggle is to hold on to your kindness and treat others with compassion, even when you're wronged. Especially when you've been wronged. Even when they use the same anger that hurt you to try to blame you for their own actions so they don't have to be accountable. You've taught me empathy, by example, over and over again. You've shown me love, when it mattered the most. You are love alive. When your dad needed the information to try take action I saw you try to offer reassurance to us and, still, for the boy that slapped you. It's me who should be reassuring you. I thought I knew generosity but I haven't had a clue. I put my hand on your father's arm, I haven't felt empathy so deeply in quite awhile. "Ben, he's not crying for him."
"I'm not crying for me."
I see it now. I see why "Jesus wept." I feel why He could do that. You cried for the same reason we all cry when we witness someone choosing to disparage themselves. Making the compromise. The essence of true loss.
I know the peace you needed when we watched the video of you being harassed on the bus. I forgot to say out loud to you, because I wouldn't know how, that I came to terms with your suffering being your own path, as we all have our own. Seeing that video enlightened your Dad and I to your spirit. You put kindness into action, too many times. It was too many times Camble and you did it over and over. You gave respect and consideration again and again and denied the parts of yourself that whispered to handle it a different way. When you needed help and you needed someone around you to take an interest you were left all alone in a bus full of people, doing nothing to help you, but you rose above. Yet, you somehow understand that you weren't going to remain the victim in all of that. No mud, no lotus. You are beauty, Sweet Son. You're struggling now and we all want better days to come, but I have faith you'll go somewhere with this. Whatever "this" is. You wouldn't be struggling if it didn't mean so much. Which is a hard thing to understand right now. Hard to stand back and witness as a parent, but we've always had faith that you kidz came to us as yourselves. When we can't be there to interfere with the ugly and participate in helping you we're left with a lot of negative emotions, as your Mom and Dad, and I'll tell you, it's kind of scary. You've consistently asked us to forgive and ".... let's just talk about something else."
I know that it means a lot to you to hold onto the promise of kindness. It means a lot to me too, Camble. Like why I plant the garden sometimes in the rain. Because it's in me. It's worth it, come what may. Later on, remember, when you came to me and confessed that if I had seen the video then I had watched you take an interest and choose to help the boy with his homework? That was all you Camble. That was your own choice, when it was hard, because he's treated you poorly in the past. Not as a bribe or manipulation, because you've never learned how to charm. It hasn't occurred to you to vie for anyone's favor. Yes, I saw you. Your sincere presence. I saw you uncomfortable for a long time, which was so hard, but I also saw you find comfort in helping too, and it had nothing to do with benefiting you. You just put it out there for the universe. That is what service is Camble. And there's another word, which I thought I knew, but you showed me through your actions. Altruism. "If you saw the video then you saw that I helped him with his homework. I thought you guys might ... be ... ashamed of me for helping him. So, I didn't write that down in all of the things that happened." That told me we've been doing this for too long Baby, and our conversations of trying to teach you how to protect yourself have gone too far. I praised you for being correct in your defenses and you had to confess to me your kindness. I'm sorry, Buddy. Where has this lead me? I'll fix that in me. For you.
Now I know why Chief Joseph said, "I will fight no more, forever ...." I understand what brought him to that place inside himself.
When I watched that video of you on the bus, last month, I couldn't help but think of what the video of you being hurt in the bathroom last year would have shown. The video I've played in my heart a million times over, because I'm your Mom. It's happened but I'm still trying to save you from it. I think I must have done something wrong or failed to not teach you to be more skeptical. Failures are our lessons but there is no comfort in that failure. My inadequacies didn't make it happen any less. You weren't wrong to be trusting and innocent. It's what my mind does to occupy my heart so it doesn't have to accept that it happened, for real. What if the boy that threw you around the bathroom could return there, to kindness, in himself, to believe he had enough and he didn't have to rob from anybody else? Camble, you directed your Dad and I when we wanted our anger to justify punishment you asked us to be compassionate. You told us you weren't safe but "I can't hurt anybody." We didn't tell too many people about what happened to you because people seemed to think your kindness made you an easy target and that was hurtful to hear. How can someone be "too kind?" Does that justify not actively preserving that kindness? There is nothing wrong with you, Camble. There is something so amazing about you. So amazing and wonderful. You aren't to be faulted for being sincere. There are things that have hurt people when they tried to be brave and be themselves and being touched by love and kindness sometimes reminds them of those hurts and how they hurt others so they have to deny kindness or they have to change. Maybe they lost their way. Kindness will make some of us adults realize we are impostors in our own lives. We're afraid to be the somebody. I was judged for being "a different person" than other parents when I didn't retaliate with vengeance in your honor. People expected more of me, but we love differently. And I know your honor Camble. It's a quiet, unassuming nobility. Valuing your dignity shouldn't have meant you were pitied and we were disregarded as if we were weak or allowed the damage. We didn't accept the lies. We knew better Camble and you helped put that into action so we could participate in it too. Kindness isn't pathetic. It's taken me a long time to see you were asking me to pause in my urgency and have patience. That left me settled in those uneasy feelings for a long time. It was just enough time to let the difficult things I felt move on. Then I recognized what remained. You needed me to love my enemy. Not to make excuses for those who wanted to be his hero, or sympathize with his damage instead of tending to you, or praying for him to stop choking you but to pray, instead, for his heart to be whole again, to be restored so he could recognize and respect the kindness that is all around him. To be loved. To feel love. To know it. Whether or not he chooses to value you, you don't need permission to be your authentic self. You reminded me of the courage it takes to say "No thank you. I won't harm you back. " and mean it. Regardless of the punishment and contempt.
Your truth and kindness are your super powers. You've shown me that you believe everyone has that same energy inside of them. Yesterday was Martin Luther King Jr. day and when I hear his pleas I see he had the same belief. That we could all return to that place of goodness inside of us. That place that lets us cry with the wounded. Weep for the damage we do to one another and know what that compromise costs.
Kindness isn't a construct. It's a compass. There is purpose in pain but life can't only be purposeful because of the pain. I appreciate the metaphorical value of these struggles and one never seems to know the meaning of things until they're on the other side of them, but I'm continually hoping we are through with this, having moved through and over or above or beyond. This can't be our new normal. I don't accept that. I do, however, appreciate the depth it has given our lives, while you have managed to not make a spectacle of your pain and you keep showing up. Showing up for life. Smiling. Simply. Being tender. As if it was the most obvious and natural thing to do. That gets lost on me for a minute, considering, and then I remember, it is the most sincere, natural thing about us all, and it is actually THAT uncomplicated.
You're special to us, Buddy, but we know you're an average, ordinary kid. Doing the most natural thing, being kind and humble. Keep at it Sweetheart. Keep at it. Please. And keep hoping others are working at it too, as best they can.
I love you, Camble. And I know that you feel loved. Thank you for being you. We're so thankful for you.
Mama
Monday, June 8, 2015
Judas Had To Betray Jesus
I'm reminded a lot lately of Morgan, 18 months, walking on the rounded rocks at Cottage Grove Lake. Her little toes curling over the ends of the stones, warm on the bottoms of her feet. I was adjusting the blanket and setting out food. She just kept walking. Ben hollered and laughed and cut through the water as fast as he could to get to her. I turned to face the commotion and he was fishing her up and out of the water. She just walked straight in and kept going. Her tiny little feet slipping over the slimy rocks, arms stretched out wide. "Can you believe that? She was just smiling up at me!! The water was two feet over her head!!" We put her on the bank but there was no interrupting her mission. She was curious. She wanted to learn. She was innocent. We took turns fishing her out of the lake at just the right time.
That is fearless.
"Lord, how do we do it? How do we embrace and yet . . . . not squeeze too tightly? Show me Your way. Let that be my way." This is the balance I am always trying to seek, while wrestling my own impulses and riding the waves in between, back and forth. Slow down too long to sort it out and you find out how much of a hustler life really is. It's easy to get carried away.
My friend Monica reminded me over the weekend about Lieutenant Dan's approach to facing the storms of life, from the movie Forest Gump. Hoisting himself up and strapping himself to the mast of the boat in cathartic mania, hurling insults at God, " . . . Is that all you've got!!??!!! Come on!! . . . " Fists clenched in the middle of the hurricane. Whew, I've been there. Faced it straight on. Even more poignant though is when Lt. Dan makes his peace with himself and God and accepts that life didn't turn out how he expected it to. It just didn't. He let go of all of the ideas he was attached to and the hurt he'd suffered that was real and yet no longer relevant. You see his agony disappear, feel his resolve and acceptance that he is still alive and whole inside and THAT was what it was all about, after all. It was enough.
I listened to a woman in Michael's the other day while she was on her cell phone trying to make plans for her grandchildren for the summer. I had to listen. I didn't want to, but she was really loud and she was camped out in front of the purple beads. The only thing I had come into the store for was purple beads. She talked about how she needed to prevent this and that from happening to her grandkidz because of what had happened to her when she was a kid at the neighbor's house. How her parents never knew about those things. She was afraid to tell them because her parents and their parents were friends. That kind of situation. My heart broke for her. Our love and loyalties can get so convoluted, can't they. And now, "I'm afraid of . . . . " this and that. 50 years later, still imprisoned by anther's mistakes. She had a lot of fears and then I'd hear her compensation strategy to make excuses for what happened to her and justify how she HAD to make sure nothing like that ever happened to her kidz or grandkidz. Every compassionate, human instinct in me wanted to lay my hand on her shoulder and tell her she'd made it. The damage was done. It's okay now. You can come out. You can live. But I didn't want her to think I was judging her. If sorrow could repair the damage her neighbor had caused. I wanted my sorrow to repair the damage someone had done to him to make him hurt people in such a way. I wanted my sorrow to help her live. Which isn't how it works at all, is it. She coordinated events and who was going to call who because some people didn't comply with her strategies and she needed everyone to do certain things and handle particular situations a certain way in case the kidz got afraid. Compensation plans constructed to be as tall as her fears. We all have 'em. Overnights would only happen when she said they could. She knew better then the parents who could really be trusted. Horseback riding was not even a possibility. I had stayed too long. I willed her peace with my whole being. I'd found what I needed.
You'll hear people's fears if you listen. Get a sense for them and know their stories. If you're quiet and just be aware. You'll recognize how lives get organized and how tragedies will define someone from then on if they cater to that event, no matter how underground their feelings are or how hidden they think their efforts and insecurities are. You can see how we will fight change to hold onto our certainties of what was or what we need to be, what we want. What if's are prevented at all costs. How we will sacrifice all of our senses to maintain a certainty we think is safe. Comfortable. More comfortable then the possibilities of change. Stay on the path of convenience. Close our hearts and minds. Try to force that on others around us to maintain that standard.
Growing hurts. It does. But what are we so afraid of?
I've struggled a lot with people's expectations of me in my life. I have to imagine people have probably struggled with my expectations as well. I've felt the pressure of other's anticipations and their disappointments when I respond predictably how I always respond to those pressures and controls, backing slowly and quietly away . . . until I can run. When I get to feeling misunderstood and like I've done it all wrong again according to someone else's standards I fight a battle with myself that resolves into remembering that I am who I am and my struggles are nothing. Nothing. What keeps that battle short is remembering Jesus, praying in the garden.
Finding balance in relationships is a tricky business. I have to remind myself it's not always about today. It's not about me. It's about the big picture. And how ridiculous is my little picture anyways? I mean, really? What year is this anyways? What universe are we living in? Who's driving this bus?
When I close my eyes and think of Jesus wrestling with the vision of His reality before Him in the garden that night. How He agonized with His hopes and the understanding of His purpose and yet He didn't cower for the sake of creating a certainty. The double negative helps me sometimes when I find myself saying, "He didn't NOT know. He knew. Jesus knew. And he wasn't Not afraid. He was afraid. He did it anyway." He didn't sell out for convenience. He didn't take control. His terror was real and yet His friends slept. He didn't puke that drama onto them. He accepted the betrayal and denial of His friends as human. His expectations of them were that they were people. They were not perfect. And He loved them none the less. None the less. His devotion to them remained. I know that is what trust is. Not trusting that people and things will always work out how you want them to, but trusting that eventually they will be okay. He didn't rally the troops and say, "Hey guyz, this is what we're going to do. We're getting a boat and making a run for Bermuda. Judas and Peter are out. Judas is an asshole. You should hate his guts. Peter is a coward. Punish him for me if I don't make it out of this thing alive." That wasn't His way, was it. So, what are we so afraid of?
The reality of life, the responsibility of raising children, the pressures of relationships wash over me and I'm constantly making my exasperated announcement, "There's just a lot of decisions to make here." Followed by my, "I have no control." because I'm only one side of those decisions. And sure, everyone has their advice and their opinions on your choices but I can't pretend to know what somebody else is trying to rise above unless I take an interest and I am not pretentious enough to pretend my excellent decision making skills have gotten me any further ahead of anybody else. I can be a real asshole. Guess what, so can you. I think about the pain I've walked through and the tragedies I've managed to escape or have been protected from and that keeps me humble. I assume everyone is broken or missing pieces. I left some on a mountain, some in an operating room a few years ago and I've picked up a few extra along the way. So, it's kind of Even Steven.
I close my eyes and think back on Morgan walking out into that lake, with her arms stretched wide. Before she knew any better. I question what "better" is. Says Who? I want to punch myself for ever inteferring or making her anything less than fearless, but accept it had to happen that way all the same. I think about Lt. Dan tied to that mast and I remember the mercy of the moment that those storms in life bring. How important it is to be open and vulnerable. How it will scare the Hell out of you. When you realize you can't match crazy, you just have to let it ride out. Look how things can change. How different we can become. How life can touch you and people can surprise you when you let them. Imagining Jesus, strapped to the cross. The peace before He was lifted up.
Judas had to betray Jesus.
That is fearless.
"Lord, how do we do it? How do we embrace and yet . . . . not squeeze too tightly? Show me Your way. Let that be my way." This is the balance I am always trying to seek, while wrestling my own impulses and riding the waves in between, back and forth. Slow down too long to sort it out and you find out how much of a hustler life really is. It's easy to get carried away.
My friend Monica reminded me over the weekend about Lieutenant Dan's approach to facing the storms of life, from the movie Forest Gump. Hoisting himself up and strapping himself to the mast of the boat in cathartic mania, hurling insults at God, " . . . Is that all you've got!!??!!! Come on!! . . . " Fists clenched in the middle of the hurricane. Whew, I've been there. Faced it straight on. Even more poignant though is when Lt. Dan makes his peace with himself and God and accepts that life didn't turn out how he expected it to. It just didn't. He let go of all of the ideas he was attached to and the hurt he'd suffered that was real and yet no longer relevant. You see his agony disappear, feel his resolve and acceptance that he is still alive and whole inside and THAT was what it was all about, after all. It was enough.
I listened to a woman in Michael's the other day while she was on her cell phone trying to make plans for her grandchildren for the summer. I had to listen. I didn't want to, but she was really loud and she was camped out in front of the purple beads. The only thing I had come into the store for was purple beads. She talked about how she needed to prevent this and that from happening to her grandkidz because of what had happened to her when she was a kid at the neighbor's house. How her parents never knew about those things. She was afraid to tell them because her parents and their parents were friends. That kind of situation. My heart broke for her. Our love and loyalties can get so convoluted, can't they. And now, "I'm afraid of . . . . " this and that. 50 years later, still imprisoned by anther's mistakes. She had a lot of fears and then I'd hear her compensation strategy to make excuses for what happened to her and justify how she HAD to make sure nothing like that ever happened to her kidz or grandkidz. Every compassionate, human instinct in me wanted to lay my hand on her shoulder and tell her she'd made it. The damage was done. It's okay now. You can come out. You can live. But I didn't want her to think I was judging her. If sorrow could repair the damage her neighbor had caused. I wanted my sorrow to repair the damage someone had done to him to make him hurt people in such a way. I wanted my sorrow to help her live. Which isn't how it works at all, is it. She coordinated events and who was going to call who because some people didn't comply with her strategies and she needed everyone to do certain things and handle particular situations a certain way in case the kidz got afraid. Compensation plans constructed to be as tall as her fears. We all have 'em. Overnights would only happen when she said they could. She knew better then the parents who could really be trusted. Horseback riding was not even a possibility. I had stayed too long. I willed her peace with my whole being. I'd found what I needed.
You'll hear people's fears if you listen. Get a sense for them and know their stories. If you're quiet and just be aware. You'll recognize how lives get organized and how tragedies will define someone from then on if they cater to that event, no matter how underground their feelings are or how hidden they think their efforts and insecurities are. You can see how we will fight change to hold onto our certainties of what was or what we need to be, what we want. What if's are prevented at all costs. How we will sacrifice all of our senses to maintain a certainty we think is safe. Comfortable. More comfortable then the possibilities of change. Stay on the path of convenience. Close our hearts and minds. Try to force that on others around us to maintain that standard.
Growing hurts. It does. But what are we so afraid of?
I've struggled a lot with people's expectations of me in my life. I have to imagine people have probably struggled with my expectations as well. I've felt the pressure of other's anticipations and their disappointments when I respond predictably how I always respond to those pressures and controls, backing slowly and quietly away . . . until I can run. When I get to feeling misunderstood and like I've done it all wrong again according to someone else's standards I fight a battle with myself that resolves into remembering that I am who I am and my struggles are nothing. Nothing. What keeps that battle short is remembering Jesus, praying in the garden.
Finding balance in relationships is a tricky business. I have to remind myself it's not always about today. It's not about me. It's about the big picture. And how ridiculous is my little picture anyways? I mean, really? What year is this anyways? What universe are we living in? Who's driving this bus?
When I close my eyes and think of Jesus wrestling with the vision of His reality before Him in the garden that night. How He agonized with His hopes and the understanding of His purpose and yet He didn't cower for the sake of creating a certainty. The double negative helps me sometimes when I find myself saying, "He didn't NOT know. He knew. Jesus knew. And he wasn't Not afraid. He was afraid. He did it anyway." He didn't sell out for convenience. He didn't take control. His terror was real and yet His friends slept. He didn't puke that drama onto them. He accepted the betrayal and denial of His friends as human. His expectations of them were that they were people. They were not perfect. And He loved them none the less. None the less. His devotion to them remained. I know that is what trust is. Not trusting that people and things will always work out how you want them to, but trusting that eventually they will be okay. He didn't rally the troops and say, "Hey guyz, this is what we're going to do. We're getting a boat and making a run for Bermuda. Judas and Peter are out. Judas is an asshole. You should hate his guts. Peter is a coward. Punish him for me if I don't make it out of this thing alive." That wasn't His way, was it. So, what are we so afraid of?
The reality of life, the responsibility of raising children, the pressures of relationships wash over me and I'm constantly making my exasperated announcement, "There's just a lot of decisions to make here." Followed by my, "I have no control." because I'm only one side of those decisions. And sure, everyone has their advice and their opinions on your choices but I can't pretend to know what somebody else is trying to rise above unless I take an interest and I am not pretentious enough to pretend my excellent decision making skills have gotten me any further ahead of anybody else. I can be a real asshole. Guess what, so can you. I think about the pain I've walked through and the tragedies I've managed to escape or have been protected from and that keeps me humble. I assume everyone is broken or missing pieces. I left some on a mountain, some in an operating room a few years ago and I've picked up a few extra along the way. So, it's kind of Even Steven.
I close my eyes and think back on Morgan walking out into that lake, with her arms stretched wide. Before she knew any better. I question what "better" is. Says Who? I want to punch myself for ever inteferring or making her anything less than fearless, but accept it had to happen that way all the same. I think about Lt. Dan tied to that mast and I remember the mercy of the moment that those storms in life bring. How important it is to be open and vulnerable. How it will scare the Hell out of you. When you realize you can't match crazy, you just have to let it ride out. Look how things can change. How different we can become. How life can touch you and people can surprise you when you let them. Imagining Jesus, strapped to the cross. The peace before He was lifted up.
Judas had to betray Jesus.
Sunday, May 10, 2015
Because You Always Need Your Mama
Samantha's hand is surprisingly smaller than I anticipated it would be. How could I not know her hand was so small? I knew it was delicate. I was teasing her about her bony elbows the other day, but how did I not know her hand was so small??? I scooped up Camble's hand in my free hand to compare. I think his might actually be a little bigger than Sam's, but she held on with such purpose. I heard her soft, sweet voice whispering to my shattered heart. "It's okay Mama."
We build our families and, simultaneously, as Mother's, construct our fortresses. It doesn't happen overnight. It's the evolution of stretching the skirt to keep everything out to the undoing of the apron strings because everybody wants out. The birthing and rebirthing. The holding so tightly to the letting go, and all of the growing pains in between. The fortress crumbles, because it needs to. We see the potential, assess the risk, and recognize it isn't ours to own anymore. We give over that which was never ours, that which we held and kept with rugged fury and tended with gentleness in kind.
My neighbor called me from her trip to Utah yesterday to wish me a wonderful and happy Mother's Day. It was so sweet. So sweet, and . . . . unexpected. She's always so sweet. I should be as sweet as her. She remembered me and I hadn't remembered her. "What? What was that? The cats??? Why would I . . . . " Oh, Dear God!!!!! I was supposed to be watching the cats?!!! Feeding the fish!!?? Since when . . . . over a week ago!!! They're probably dead!! I forgot to bring them into the fortress!!
My family watched me absorb the information and they all took a step back while I bought my ticket and rode my ride. They are constant spectators to this emotional roller coaster. Instead of screaming in silence and walking to the garden, I walked myself through the process aloud. I shut down the attempts to fix and criticize and rationalize. I shunned the excuses. I explained myself for me. I swore. I almost threw up. We were in public and silently they all held a new appreciation for the composure I ask of myself. Then, they lost security in that holding me down. It could get wild. Maybe letting out some line would mean I'd tire myself out quicker. They decided to let me be my gypsy self. Finally, my pace matched my tone, when I found my Mother. That voice. It was the rain they hadn't expected on the clear sunny day but accepted would happen and then pass, bringing what was needed. The sun was shining again. Camble was on his third taco.
"Mistakes happen. These things happen sweetheart." That voice. The one that reminds you to bury the harsh in a deep dark hole because it has no place in the getting on and along. The one you wish and wish and wish that you're children will hear and tell themselves when they need it the very most. That ancient voice. The kindness. The one that says it will all be okay. Maybe not right now. Maybe not today. But have faith. Do the hard things. You are good at this. You'll rise above. You will. The one that reminds you we all get a little lost but we haven't lost it all.
I apologized and put my head down on the table. Morgan's arms came around mine and I envisioned from above we must closely resemble the yin and the yang to manage this comfortably. I never intended to mean so much to anyone. I didn't know growing was the surprised look you have when you suddenly realize their pants are too short or the seams are all coming unraveled. Nobody tells you these things. I never thought it would take such a tight grip. Then, you hear Mother. You become your own mother. You look down and feel the soft, small hand in yours and you know to let go.
You always need your Mama.
Thursday, September 4, 2014
Seeds
Confession: I harrassed a cashier lady at the grocery store a few weeks ago. That was me. If you saw the whole thing go down and were wondering. It was me. I was that woman. And I was pretty upset while I was doing it. I got loud and serious and pointed fingers and the whole shebang. I think I might have scared her a little, and everyone around me. She had that look of compliance a two year old gives you when you've removed all of their worldly possessions and threaten them with the spanking, and you both know that you mean it this time. She asked for her manager in a desperate panic over the intercom, " . . . Uuuum, ugh, . . . . Manager???? . . . to checkstand 13 . . . . ". Scratch, as the intercom shuts off and she tried to not face me while she waited for her white horse. But I pretty much held the gun to her head. I wasn't walking out of that store without the reciept of the lady in front of me (point, point) and the one behind me, (point, point) who was twitching and shaking and wobbling with a baby on her hip, waiting to bag the rest of her purchase after I stopped making a scene. I wasn't walking out of the store without those reciepts and she knew it.
Now, sitting here this morning, pouring over these receipts again, before I get up the gumption to pay my bills, I'm asking myself why I did that to that cashier. How could I? What exactly did I have the intention of doing with these receipts anyway? What importance did they represent? Can't I just be nice???? I can't help but feel like there is this tiny little thread of relation weaving around through my life and our current events and maybe these receipts have ended up being the little ticket to my own personal understanding.
I had gone through the store that day with a calculator. I passed on the apples because my neighbor was kind enough to offer me his. I didn't need carrots because Brazen is having an amazing crop this year. I did need bananas and Ben's trail mix. He always acts like it is such a surprise when I remember to get him his lunch makings. Not because he is forgotten, but because he is understanding enough to know that we have tough choices to make and he doesn't want to be thought of first. He doesn't expect it. Isn't that funny? He doesn't expect his humble lunch makings. Trail mix ingredients from the bulk foods section of WinCo. And he's willing to go without. But I had a budget of $200.00 and that would leave us with $25.50 for miscellaneous. And I was feeling blessed that I could do this and make it happen. I even got Sam and Morgan some cocoa and Brazen some chocolate covered raisins for his after school jar. Camble had asked about getting floss and so I got one for every bathroom. I guess that's where I went over. By a whole $1.20. I should have just done the rounding up trick. And maybe I wouldn't have been so upset about that one dollar and 20 cents if I hadn't just witnessed the woman in front of me purchase 6 monster Drinks, Doritos, Cocoa Puffs, Tootsie Pops, Mars Snax Bars, Frozen Talapia, Lays Chips, Pepsi, Pace Picante Sauce, Extra Gum and Coffee Creamer. I was in such awe I stopped bagging my own groceries and just watched hers go down the little grocery bagging area. It was like they were doing a little dance before my eyes. I couldn't stop watching. Then, because I was so intrigued by her outstanding food choices, I was even more curious about her method of paying for such wonderful food items. And, yes, it was all paid for by an Oregon Trail card.
Something inside of me snapped. Literally disconnected. I didn't intend to be hostile, but I blurted out, "That's not food! None of that is actually food. How can she pay for that with an Oregon Trail card?" SHE was still standing beside me. I guess I had forgotten that she was actually a person. For some reason I must have decided the poor clerk was the gistapo of the whole welfare system. Or, apparently I was. Who knew? Because really, what I was saying was, "I don't want to pay for that! In fact, THE AMERCIAN PEOPLE . . . . " The cashier then assured me that it was, in fact, all considered food items. Then something even more curious happenned. When I regained my composure a little I noticed that the woman, who's purchase I was so offended by, wasn't even phased by my objections. She was just casually waiting with her cart. She had actually bagged her items. She was also in communication with the woman in line behind me to conspire to make certain purchased with her card because she only had so much of a balance and the woman behind me must've had more on her card. More Doritos, cherry pies, chocolate pies, tortilla chips, Folgers Coffee, 2 packs of 24 cans of Pepsi, Red Bull Energy Drinks, 2 packages of imittation crab, more gum, Franz White Bread, Lays Wavy Chips, etc. I began bagging my groceries so I wouldn't let myself be a voyer as she took out her card. I knew it was going to happen. I just pretendied it was behind closed doors and it was none of my business. This time. I was playing nice. But, I couldn't deny it was my business all the same. It made my head spin to look at our carts sitting there beside each other. I wanted to take a picture, but felt like I'd already taken things too far and didn't want to become one of "those" people, along with the person I had just become.
I have kept the reciepts. I guess I wanted to try to play the "No Way" game with myself and refer back to them when I started to question the realilty of it all. I went to my car with my head down, feeling ashamed for attacking the cashier and embarrassing the two women who I treated like criminals. I thought of that little baby that the woman was bouncing on her hip. Not a soothing bounce, but a gittered up, uncontrolled body jerking of a bounce. I reconsidered the contents of makings of all of those food items in their carts. I wanted to rescue the little girl and squeeze her and sit and let life happen in front of her while she sat still quietly, discovering and deciding how she wanted to step into it. I apologized to her with my tears and said I was sorry that I had just bought her Mama garbage to fuel her body and brain. That didn't represent my values or my beliefs, but nobody is really asking me what those are either.
Now, sitting here this morning, pouring over these receipts again, before I get up the gumption to pay my bills, I'm asking myself why I did that to that cashier. How could I? What exactly did I have the intention of doing with these receipts anyway? What importance did they represent? Can't I just be nice???? I can't help but feel like there is this tiny little thread of relation weaving around through my life and our current events and maybe these receipts have ended up being the little ticket to my own personal understanding.
I had gone through the store that day with a calculator. I passed on the apples because my neighbor was kind enough to offer me his. I didn't need carrots because Brazen is having an amazing crop this year. I did need bananas and Ben's trail mix. He always acts like it is such a surprise when I remember to get him his lunch makings. Not because he is forgotten, but because he is understanding enough to know that we have tough choices to make and he doesn't want to be thought of first. He doesn't expect it. Isn't that funny? He doesn't expect his humble lunch makings. Trail mix ingredients from the bulk foods section of WinCo. And he's willing to go without. But I had a budget of $200.00 and that would leave us with $25.50 for miscellaneous. And I was feeling blessed that I could do this and make it happen. I even got Sam and Morgan some cocoa and Brazen some chocolate covered raisins for his after school jar. Camble had asked about getting floss and so I got one for every bathroom. I guess that's where I went over. By a whole $1.20. I should have just done the rounding up trick. And maybe I wouldn't have been so upset about that one dollar and 20 cents if I hadn't just witnessed the woman in front of me purchase 6 monster Drinks, Doritos, Cocoa Puffs, Tootsie Pops, Mars Snax Bars, Frozen Talapia, Lays Chips, Pepsi, Pace Picante Sauce, Extra Gum and Coffee Creamer. I was in such awe I stopped bagging my own groceries and just watched hers go down the little grocery bagging area. It was like they were doing a little dance before my eyes. I couldn't stop watching. Then, because I was so intrigued by her outstanding food choices, I was even more curious about her method of paying for such wonderful food items. And, yes, it was all paid for by an Oregon Trail card.
Something inside of me snapped. Literally disconnected. I didn't intend to be hostile, but I blurted out, "That's not food! None of that is actually food. How can she pay for that with an Oregon Trail card?" SHE was still standing beside me. I guess I had forgotten that she was actually a person. For some reason I must have decided the poor clerk was the gistapo of the whole welfare system. Or, apparently I was. Who knew? Because really, what I was saying was, "I don't want to pay for that! In fact, THE AMERCIAN PEOPLE . . . . " The cashier then assured me that it was, in fact, all considered food items. Then something even more curious happenned. When I regained my composure a little I noticed that the woman, who's purchase I was so offended by, wasn't even phased by my objections. She was just casually waiting with her cart. She had actually bagged her items. She was also in communication with the woman in line behind me to conspire to make certain purchased with her card because she only had so much of a balance and the woman behind me must've had more on her card. More Doritos, cherry pies, chocolate pies, tortilla chips, Folgers Coffee, 2 packs of 24 cans of Pepsi, Red Bull Energy Drinks, 2 packages of imittation crab, more gum, Franz White Bread, Lays Wavy Chips, etc. I began bagging my groceries so I wouldn't let myself be a voyer as she took out her card. I knew it was going to happen. I just pretendied it was behind closed doors and it was none of my business. This time. I was playing nice. But, I couldn't deny it was my business all the same. It made my head spin to look at our carts sitting there beside each other. I wanted to take a picture, but felt like I'd already taken things too far and didn't want to become one of "those" people, along with the person I had just become.
I have kept the reciepts. I guess I wanted to try to play the "No Way" game with myself and refer back to them when I started to question the realilty of it all. I went to my car with my head down, feeling ashamed for attacking the cashier and embarrassing the two women who I treated like criminals. I thought of that little baby that the woman was bouncing on her hip. Not a soothing bounce, but a gittered up, uncontrolled body jerking of a bounce. I reconsidered the contents of makings of all of those food items in their carts. I wanted to rescue the little girl and squeeze her and sit and let life happen in front of her while she sat still quietly, discovering and deciding how she wanted to step into it. I apologized to her with my tears and said I was sorry that I had just bought her Mama garbage to fuel her body and brain. That didn't represent my values or my beliefs, but nobody is really asking me what those are either.
I remember standing in the cheese lines when I was a little girl. I remember the indignity I shouldered because in my mother's desperation she chose an easy escape and assumed her appropriate attitude of victim and entitlement. I learned that the word "They" referred to everybody yet nobody. "They" were the people that owed her and we needed to be defensive to. Everybody owed her. Nobody wanted to, but she was entitled. She was deserving of everything. And that attitude made me embarrassed, for her sake. Standing in my red coat from Goodwill, on the streets of Salem, in the cold with my brothers and sisters. We waited to be handed our bricks of cheese. Free cheese that we deserved. We didn't even eat the cheese all of the time. But it was important that it was free and "They" said we could have it. Yet we were to be thankful for it. Even though it was somehow owed to us. For something. Owed to my mother. For having children, I guessed. Nobody talked about it. I just had to assume you got free cheese because you had children. And my mother had a lot of children. So she deserved a lot of cheese. I just had to decipher the looks and anticipate how much "They" decided we deserved. When my mother was sure she deserved everything. No matter what the rules where, or who "They" were, there were only real live people behind those tables, passing out boxed up cheese loafs and judgement on those Salem streets. I couldn't make sense of it. Who were the "They"?
Now I'm one of the "They".
I harrassed that cashier because judging those women somehow made that little girl inside of me hand out retribution to all of those who judged me. I wanted somehow to show that little baby being shaken and jerked around that there is a better way and surely I'd discovered it. I guess I thought I needed to save her before she even realized she needed to be saved. Somehow I believed my judgement would shine a light on her lost mother. I just gave her more of what she's grown so accustomed to its easy to just ignore. Ignoring my judgement probably made me feel like thrashing her with my icy stares and projected disgust wasn't going to make the revolutionary changes I needed it to make. All for her own benefit, I'm sure. I was convinced.
I think I may have been more effective if I could have let my relatively for her situation guide me to understanding and kindness. I didn't know how to educate that little baby or those two woman on healthy food choices in an instance so I used that valuable time to deliver harsh judgement instead, hoping that impact would inspire them to search out the options and alternatives. Just like those women handing out the cheese directed me.
I started carrying seeds in my bag. When I run out I go back to Down To Earth and I pick some more out, completely randomly, and stick them back in my bag. When I find myself in these situations, like the grocery store incident, I quietly pull out some seeds and give them away. Flowers. Pumpkins. Cilantro. Flowers. Kholrobi. Flowers. And that is what I'd like to be symbolic of who I am and what I believe instead.
Sunday, July 20, 2014
Struggles
Today, as Brazen and Samantha were helping me, helping their family, in the morning chaos I had to remind myself and them that the struggle was just part of life sometimes and reassured them it was okay. And I hope they can develop their own comfort with our chaos, that involves offering their love and understanding as the necessary tool.
It reminds me to let them see me struggle. To let them see me try and fail and resume life all over again. To let them witness that failure not defining me. When they see me cry over loss and hopes crushed and letting them feel satisfied that their love makes a difference in the mending. Sometimes I see the wonder in their eyes when they see someone upset and I think that because they understand that there is a degree of loss or pain or struggle they get caught up in the moment and don't know if life will exist beyond this immediate circumstance. When the currant returns and they recognize life flows beyond what has just happened, or what we are afraid is going to happen, I see the relief wash over them.
And, it reminds me to let them struggle. To take a step back and let them count on loving arms, regardless of their journey.
My Dad used to tell me, "I can help you, but I can't do it for you."
I'm grateful to hear those words echoed to me and represent a cautious hand when I want to make the easy choice and do it all for them.
Wednesday, June 25, 2014
Maybe Sometimes I Feel Like That Vacuum
Samantha,
You're still sleeping. We had your graduation party last night and although I asked others to take a minute to write a reflection or share a drawing or offer some nugget of understanding to help light your way I didn't get a chance to sit down and give you my two cents worth. I was waiting for the inspiration and would you believe I found it in the conversations last evening and . . . of all things . . . our vacuum.
Right about now, when I was your age, 14 and I had graduated from the 8th grade I was a very different person. A different person than I've grown into being and a different person than who you are already. I was living in Coquille and my parents, at the time, Don and Jonnie, had rented out our home to another family. I was actually living with Dana Brice, and her family on the other side of town. The plan was to get rid of everything, bring a cardboard barrel of toilet paper with us, live in a camper on the back of our '74 Ford Pick Up and move to Belize to stay forever. I translated that to be until the toilet paper ran out. I wasn't actually a part of The Plan, or any plan, and I was angry. I was an angry person at that point. I was also in love. Life is like that.
There wasn't a big ceremony of any sorts that I can remember participating in for our class. Maybe something happened in the gym at lunch. It's all a blur. There were some families that had put some effort into making the event a special happening and so I remember some of my friends and other classmates had family in town or they had been given a gift of jewelry or something to mark the day as other than ordinary. Sensing the commotion and realizing other families had gone out of their way, on some level, to mark the event of being promoted to High School gave me an understanding that there was something important about what was happening and, simultaneously left me feeling a whole lot forgotten about. But I was excited and happy for my friends.
My parents had come up with this cockamamy plan to move to Belize. I had no voice. I guess they didn't want me included in the packing process either because I was invited to leave and Dana invited me to stay with her. Dana excelled at everything athletic and was just as accomplished at school, in every subject. To flatter her makes me feel a little phony because she wouldn't have wanted all of the fuss. She was so honest with herself and everyone around her that I think some people found that a little off putting. I found it refreshing. You could count on her to call a spade a spade and that was nothing short of wonderful as far as I was concerned. It was something I admired and appreciated as much as a cool breath of air in my dark and dank room of a life could be appreciated. I just had to be when I was around her. That simplicity was a perfect dose of reality. The parts of her life that were private she was very capable and responsible for and she owned them without hostility. Getting to stay with her and share all the corners of her life helped me to see that the whole picture of her life had just as much integrity as I had naturally assumed it would. She brushed her teeth at night, without even being asked. And she was sweet. The generosity of her spirit wasn't a surprise, but it was what I connected to and what I appreciated about her the very most.
Dana, bless her heart, gave me a balloon for graduation day and her sweetness in that gesture was all I needed to signify that I was a part of the happening as well and that Belize was far away, as it should be. We were sisters, instantly, at least for the time being. I had to go to my house to get some things and when I got home the balloon had wrangled it's way out of my hand and straight up and away into the big Coquille sky before I realized I ever had a desire to be able to be that high. As it floated up, my heart fell down. But, I still had Dana and Danny to look forward to.
I met Danny in the spring, during track season. He was in High School and helped with one of our track meets. The long jump, in particular. Standing there with his clipboard, flirting with all of the girlz who were wooing over him. I didn't long jump. I was on my way over to the shot put and heard his voice, that jerked my head around to find what earthly being it was coming from because, I hadn't so much heard it as I had felt it . . . and recognized it. Although we had never met. And, yes, it was that quick. My heart had found its home.
Dana knew Danny. My dad had a no dating policy and that meant I might not get to know him. He was friends with her older brother, Derek. They hurdled together and had quite the friendly rivalry going. What if we wrote him a letter? She would help me write him a letter. I should write him a letter, we had decided, I guess. So, I wrote my very first love letter, with the courage I borrowed from Dana, my sister in life. I can remember sitting there on her bed, pen and paper in front of me, wads of started letters all over the floor, South America in the back of my brain, sweat under my armpits, my stomach and shoulders on fire with nerves, but feeling nothing but encouraged. I was so drunk on love and appropriately inspired that the final draft of my polished letter was delivered to him saying, "Dear Danny, Hello sweatheart . . . . " I blamed Dana. I had exhausted her impeccable spelling talents with the 40 previous beginnings. I'm sure I managed to spell "sweetheart" so many times that it had blurred on the page and lost all meaning. Or, I had created a new meaning. We just wanted to get the letter to him and make good things start happening. "Sweatheart." I did that.
Belize never ended up happening. The plans fell through and at the last minute my parents found a house to rent on top of a mountain, 15 miles outside of Myrtle Point, on Dement Creek road. Since they had cleared out our house and the family of a friend of mine from Myrtle Point was already moving in canceling all moving plans wasn't possible. As indignant as I was to accept the reality of moving to Belize and coveting toilet paper, I was incapable of coming to terms with moving to the next town as far away by road proximity as possible from my friends and . . . . Danny. I had ended relationships and began one on the intoxicating possibility that I was now an adventurer, whether or not I wanted to be one. It was my destiny, or so I had been told. Then I was informed it was all for not. Minds were changed. The drugs had to have run out. Lord knows we still had all of the toilet paper. When the news came to me I become boiling, white hot angry. I don't handle indecision well. I'm not a dependant person and I don't require permenance. Life is a circle of changes and being able to adapt is essential, but I have no respect for stirring everyones lives up and about and then leaving them there to spin and sail through the sky. I don't talk about anything unless I'm willing to see it through and make it happen. You know that. Half of the time I don't even talk about it. Not that I'm impulsive, I just get it done. Now you know why. Thank God I was such a good letter writer. Up to the mountain we went.
That all seems pretty far away now. About 20 lifetimes ago or so. Here you are, all of 14, staring me in the face, and I want to try to take a long step back to somehow illustrate to you that you are overcoming things in life that are going to affect you and shape who you are. I don't know if it's important to try to put that into a particular category or appreciate a perspective now, but just understand that there is that promise and accept that you will have to embrace it all as best as you can and find the meaning in it all for your very own. And, remember you're not alone. I was living the life I had right in front of me every day until I had you. There was no way I could have anticipated that change, but I was open to it. Bringing you into this world was the first truly important thing I really did in this world. For this world. Out of this world. It was beyond me and changed everything. Absolutley everything. You are your very own, but I claim you and I always will. You're my girl.
Samantha, when I was 14, I was somewhere between the throws of childhood and womanhood with no outlet to express my earned understandings or hopes for the future. I had to scrape and scrap. I was in the backyard patterning a way too tiny bikini and cutting up a rubber floaty into little triangles and stratigically tieing them together with bread ties and string from the frayed clothesline because I had decided I could make my own but wanting to preserve every part of innocence contained in my body. I was deciding to not be confused and making decisions about accepting beauty and ugliness that surrounded me but I didn't know how to take those first big steps inside of my soul and project that outwards. I was looking, searching. My eyes were bright and even if half of my heart was in a hole I had shoulders and ears and elbows leaning towards the light. That is what I decided to let guide me.
And here we are. You're dad fixed the vacuum a few years ago for me for Valentine's Day. Bear with me here. So, I had broken the vacuum, again. We were going to have company over and I wanted to vacuum the rugs but gave up on it because I had broken the stupid vacuum. Your dad quietly took the vacuum out to the barn while I grabbed the broom and complained about how I would be sweeping the stupid rugs. They became stupid, along with the vacuum. I wrote the vacuum off as going to the dump and thought your dad was working on other projects. I continued tidying and then, vwalla, there was the vacuum in front of me. Your dad had never used that stupid thing and so he didn't know how to compare it's performance but he was excited to have tried to make an improvement for me. He asked me to try it out and we were both excited to have it working. Me, because he had gone out of his way to see to this for me and I could quantify the improvements, and your dad, because I was happy. Sure, the light didn't work. The side bumper piece was still broken off. Your dad busted off the left side of the plastic frame in the barn. The dusting attachment was long gone, the wand has been split and duct taped and the upoltstry attachment hadn't functioned since the word go. It sounds simple, but for all of the broken parts, it was still working, and I could see through all of that. It was restored and doing what it was intended to do. It worked.
I talked with folks last night and we moved through the crowd and I talked about my broken parts and pieces and I'm sure I have some that I've lost along the way. We talked about all you've overcome as of recently and it's been a lot. Two tons. But you did it girl. And the sun came up this morning and before I openned my eyes I had that moment. That moment I've talked to you about. That quick little skip of second you get blessed with every day when your eyes are still shut and you realize, "Yes, I'm alive." I clear the butterflies in my stomach and Thank God and start moving all of these broken parts and pieces forward. Another day. Some more good. Help me, Lord.
Some dayz I feel like that old vacuum. That's for sure. But along the way I've also realized there are two forces in life and everyday you wake up you have to pick a side. Not just once. Maybe 5, maybe 500 times that day. You have to decide between good and bad and both of those forces want you. They both have different methods of operation. You have to decide what you are going to focus on. Good strengthens good. Bad distracts and destroys the good. And it's as simple as that. I'm sensitive to trying to generate good and give people good. You were intended for good. You inspired the good in me. Watching you through the past weeks has reaffirmed so many things for me, as your mother, as a daughter, as a woman and as a human being. It's also helped to remind me that this is why we overcome. This is why we keep moving forward. With our broken backs and our whooping cough and our rotten teachers and crappy people trying serve their own intentions. Gravitate to that light. Keep taking that outward step. Do what you were intended to do. Disregard the rest.
My Grampa used to call all of the garbage in life "pucky" or "horse shit." I have learned to listen when old men decide to be frank. Gardening has helped me gain a lot of insight into that declaration. He'd tell me horse shit wasn't good for anything. He was right Samantha. And I've seen how some people try to give that away. Some people try to sell it. They'll sell it to you in truck loads. I think I've ended up with some in my garden. I'm not buying anymore. You think about that one honey.
Thank you for allowing me the privilege of being your Mom. My favorite book, you know, is The Prophet, by Kahlil Gibran. Grandpa Jed gave it to me when I was 16 and they had just adopted me. Probably I can give the credit for all of my parenting perspective and restraint to his poem on children. I want to share it with you and tell you that I know figuring this whole gig out with me hasn't always been the easiest, and it won't always be, but we have done it together. You, me and the universe. You see me now, in the now, but you need to understand that the good I have in me has been supported by people like my Grampa Bill, Dana, Danny, your Dad, you, your brothers and sister, Aunt Kath, Auntie Lisa, the good I find in my friends and the good I want to spontaneously support in strangers. Those connections are crucial. I admire the focus you have been blessed with and pray that is something you maintain and grow. You will need it. Today, you are, oh my goodness, light years ahead of where I was right now at your age sweetheart. (SWEEEEEEETHEART) I see that as goodness. You are going to be a part of a lot of people's stories and I am blessed to have you as a huge part of mine.
I love you Little Mama. You are loved. So loved.
Big Mama
You're still sleeping. We had your graduation party last night and although I asked others to take a minute to write a reflection or share a drawing or offer some nugget of understanding to help light your way I didn't get a chance to sit down and give you my two cents worth. I was waiting for the inspiration and would you believe I found it in the conversations last evening and . . . of all things . . . our vacuum.
Right about now, when I was your age, 14 and I had graduated from the 8th grade I was a very different person. A different person than I've grown into being and a different person than who you are already. I was living in Coquille and my parents, at the time, Don and Jonnie, had rented out our home to another family. I was actually living with Dana Brice, and her family on the other side of town. The plan was to get rid of everything, bring a cardboard barrel of toilet paper with us, live in a camper on the back of our '74 Ford Pick Up and move to Belize to stay forever. I translated that to be until the toilet paper ran out. I wasn't actually a part of The Plan, or any plan, and I was angry. I was an angry person at that point. I was also in love. Life is like that.
There wasn't a big ceremony of any sorts that I can remember participating in for our class. Maybe something happened in the gym at lunch. It's all a blur. There were some families that had put some effort into making the event a special happening and so I remember some of my friends and other classmates had family in town or they had been given a gift of jewelry or something to mark the day as other than ordinary. Sensing the commotion and realizing other families had gone out of their way, on some level, to mark the event of being promoted to High School gave me an understanding that there was something important about what was happening and, simultaneously left me feeling a whole lot forgotten about. But I was excited and happy for my friends.
My parents had come up with this cockamamy plan to move to Belize. I had no voice. I guess they didn't want me included in the packing process either because I was invited to leave and Dana invited me to stay with her. Dana excelled at everything athletic and was just as accomplished at school, in every subject. To flatter her makes me feel a little phony because she wouldn't have wanted all of the fuss. She was so honest with herself and everyone around her that I think some people found that a little off putting. I found it refreshing. You could count on her to call a spade a spade and that was nothing short of wonderful as far as I was concerned. It was something I admired and appreciated as much as a cool breath of air in my dark and dank room of a life could be appreciated. I just had to be when I was around her. That simplicity was a perfect dose of reality. The parts of her life that were private she was very capable and responsible for and she owned them without hostility. Getting to stay with her and share all the corners of her life helped me to see that the whole picture of her life had just as much integrity as I had naturally assumed it would. She brushed her teeth at night, without even being asked. And she was sweet. The generosity of her spirit wasn't a surprise, but it was what I connected to and what I appreciated about her the very most.
Dana, bless her heart, gave me a balloon for graduation day and her sweetness in that gesture was all I needed to signify that I was a part of the happening as well and that Belize was far away, as it should be. We were sisters, instantly, at least for the time being. I had to go to my house to get some things and when I got home the balloon had wrangled it's way out of my hand and straight up and away into the big Coquille sky before I realized I ever had a desire to be able to be that high. As it floated up, my heart fell down. But, I still had Dana and Danny to look forward to.
I met Danny in the spring, during track season. He was in High School and helped with one of our track meets. The long jump, in particular. Standing there with his clipboard, flirting with all of the girlz who were wooing over him. I didn't long jump. I was on my way over to the shot put and heard his voice, that jerked my head around to find what earthly being it was coming from because, I hadn't so much heard it as I had felt it . . . and recognized it. Although we had never met. And, yes, it was that quick. My heart had found its home.
Dana knew Danny. My dad had a no dating policy and that meant I might not get to know him. He was friends with her older brother, Derek. They hurdled together and had quite the friendly rivalry going. What if we wrote him a letter? She would help me write him a letter. I should write him a letter, we had decided, I guess. So, I wrote my very first love letter, with the courage I borrowed from Dana, my sister in life. I can remember sitting there on her bed, pen and paper in front of me, wads of started letters all over the floor, South America in the back of my brain, sweat under my armpits, my stomach and shoulders on fire with nerves, but feeling nothing but encouraged. I was so drunk on love and appropriately inspired that the final draft of my polished letter was delivered to him saying, "Dear Danny, Hello sweatheart . . . . " I blamed Dana. I had exhausted her impeccable spelling talents with the 40 previous beginnings. I'm sure I managed to spell "sweetheart" so many times that it had blurred on the page and lost all meaning. Or, I had created a new meaning. We just wanted to get the letter to him and make good things start happening. "Sweatheart." I did that.
Belize never ended up happening. The plans fell through and at the last minute my parents found a house to rent on top of a mountain, 15 miles outside of Myrtle Point, on Dement Creek road. Since they had cleared out our house and the family of a friend of mine from Myrtle Point was already moving in canceling all moving plans wasn't possible. As indignant as I was to accept the reality of moving to Belize and coveting toilet paper, I was incapable of coming to terms with moving to the next town as far away by road proximity as possible from my friends and . . . . Danny. I had ended relationships and began one on the intoxicating possibility that I was now an adventurer, whether or not I wanted to be one. It was my destiny, or so I had been told. Then I was informed it was all for not. Minds were changed. The drugs had to have run out. Lord knows we still had all of the toilet paper. When the news came to me I become boiling, white hot angry. I don't handle indecision well. I'm not a dependant person and I don't require permenance. Life is a circle of changes and being able to adapt is essential, but I have no respect for stirring everyones lives up and about and then leaving them there to spin and sail through the sky. I don't talk about anything unless I'm willing to see it through and make it happen. You know that. Half of the time I don't even talk about it. Not that I'm impulsive, I just get it done. Now you know why. Thank God I was such a good letter writer. Up to the mountain we went.
That all seems pretty far away now. About 20 lifetimes ago or so. Here you are, all of 14, staring me in the face, and I want to try to take a long step back to somehow illustrate to you that you are overcoming things in life that are going to affect you and shape who you are. I don't know if it's important to try to put that into a particular category or appreciate a perspective now, but just understand that there is that promise and accept that you will have to embrace it all as best as you can and find the meaning in it all for your very own. And, remember you're not alone. I was living the life I had right in front of me every day until I had you. There was no way I could have anticipated that change, but I was open to it. Bringing you into this world was the first truly important thing I really did in this world. For this world. Out of this world. It was beyond me and changed everything. Absolutley everything. You are your very own, but I claim you and I always will. You're my girl.
Samantha, when I was 14, I was somewhere between the throws of childhood and womanhood with no outlet to express my earned understandings or hopes for the future. I had to scrape and scrap. I was in the backyard patterning a way too tiny bikini and cutting up a rubber floaty into little triangles and stratigically tieing them together with bread ties and string from the frayed clothesline because I had decided I could make my own but wanting to preserve every part of innocence contained in my body. I was deciding to not be confused and making decisions about accepting beauty and ugliness that surrounded me but I didn't know how to take those first big steps inside of my soul and project that outwards. I was looking, searching. My eyes were bright and even if half of my heart was in a hole I had shoulders and ears and elbows leaning towards the light. That is what I decided to let guide me.
And here we are. You're dad fixed the vacuum a few years ago for me for Valentine's Day. Bear with me here. So, I had broken the vacuum, again. We were going to have company over and I wanted to vacuum the rugs but gave up on it because I had broken the stupid vacuum. Your dad quietly took the vacuum out to the barn while I grabbed the broom and complained about how I would be sweeping the stupid rugs. They became stupid, along with the vacuum. I wrote the vacuum off as going to the dump and thought your dad was working on other projects. I continued tidying and then, vwalla, there was the vacuum in front of me. Your dad had never used that stupid thing and so he didn't know how to compare it's performance but he was excited to have tried to make an improvement for me. He asked me to try it out and we were both excited to have it working. Me, because he had gone out of his way to see to this for me and I could quantify the improvements, and your dad, because I was happy. Sure, the light didn't work. The side bumper piece was still broken off. Your dad busted off the left side of the plastic frame in the barn. The dusting attachment was long gone, the wand has been split and duct taped and the upoltstry attachment hadn't functioned since the word go. It sounds simple, but for all of the broken parts, it was still working, and I could see through all of that. It was restored and doing what it was intended to do. It worked.
I talked with folks last night and we moved through the crowd and I talked about my broken parts and pieces and I'm sure I have some that I've lost along the way. We talked about all you've overcome as of recently and it's been a lot. Two tons. But you did it girl. And the sun came up this morning and before I openned my eyes I had that moment. That moment I've talked to you about. That quick little skip of second you get blessed with every day when your eyes are still shut and you realize, "Yes, I'm alive." I clear the butterflies in my stomach and Thank God and start moving all of these broken parts and pieces forward. Another day. Some more good. Help me, Lord.
Some dayz I feel like that old vacuum. That's for sure. But along the way I've also realized there are two forces in life and everyday you wake up you have to pick a side. Not just once. Maybe 5, maybe 500 times that day. You have to decide between good and bad and both of those forces want you. They both have different methods of operation. You have to decide what you are going to focus on. Good strengthens good. Bad distracts and destroys the good. And it's as simple as that. I'm sensitive to trying to generate good and give people good. You were intended for good. You inspired the good in me. Watching you through the past weeks has reaffirmed so many things for me, as your mother, as a daughter, as a woman and as a human being. It's also helped to remind me that this is why we overcome. This is why we keep moving forward. With our broken backs and our whooping cough and our rotten teachers and crappy people trying serve their own intentions. Gravitate to that light. Keep taking that outward step. Do what you were intended to do. Disregard the rest.
My Grampa used to call all of the garbage in life "pucky" or "horse shit." I have learned to listen when old men decide to be frank. Gardening has helped me gain a lot of insight into that declaration. He'd tell me horse shit wasn't good for anything. He was right Samantha. And I've seen how some people try to give that away. Some people try to sell it. They'll sell it to you in truck loads. I think I've ended up with some in my garden. I'm not buying anymore. You think about that one honey.
Thank you for allowing me the privilege of being your Mom. My favorite book, you know, is The Prophet, by Kahlil Gibran. Grandpa Jed gave it to me when I was 16 and they had just adopted me. Probably I can give the credit for all of my parenting perspective and restraint to his poem on children. I want to share it with you and tell you that I know figuring this whole gig out with me hasn't always been the easiest, and it won't always be, but we have done it together. You, me and the universe. You see me now, in the now, but you need to understand that the good I have in me has been supported by people like my Grampa Bill, Dana, Danny, your Dad, you, your brothers and sister, Aunt Kath, Auntie Lisa, the good I find in my friends and the good I want to spontaneously support in strangers. Those connections are crucial. I admire the focus you have been blessed with and pray that is something you maintain and grow. You will need it. Today, you are, oh my goodness, light years ahead of where I was right now at your age sweetheart. (SWEEEEEEETHEART) I see that as goodness. You are going to be a part of a lot of people's stories and I am blessed to have you as a huge part of mine.
On Children
Kahlil Gibran
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.
I love you Little Mama. You are loved. So loved.
Big Mama
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