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Rest

I always feel vaguely guilty when I hear the stories other women tell of their chaotic lives.

Mine is not like that.

In fact, because I have no children, my days often suffer from a lack of chaos, so as a woman I must create my own. I really do think it’s a female thing, this need for emotional agitation, and though I’ve often railed against being considered a woman, I acknowledge that my hormones know otherwise.

They mock me.

They pop out like Jacks-in-the-Box and scare the people around me sometimes. I can see it on their faces.

But I love these little monsters. They’re mine, and when they speak to me and through me, I am at their mercy. I am frequently sent to the corner for a time out when I let them get the best of me. I am humbled by them.

It’s taken more than 30 years to develop a healthy relationship with my demon hormones, and now, just as I’m getting comfortable that relationship is about to change. Isn’t that just how these bitches operate?? I swear….

But it’s an extraordinary relationship nevertheless. I feel like I’ve had the best of both sides of the coin; a physicality that has let me participate in more masculine pursuits along with the gentleness of a mama bear with her cub. I feel complete in my composition.

On those nights when I sleep well, when I haven’t aggravated the demons to the point that they nag me into racing consciousness all night, I hear the gentle words, the creative thoughts they share when they’re not angry. Their gentle cooing eases me into dream-filled sleep.

In gratitude I assure them that there is no reason to panic. Their legacy will live on, if not through physical manifestation, at least in the form of ironic laughter at the torment they once inspired that defined the essence of who I became.

Today I am grateful for ALL that I am…

Resurrection and New Life

Last week I posted a bit of a rant about my recent mural painting experience. I needed to let ‘r rip and purge the stuff that was making my insides roil. Good thing it had to do with a toilet .

But things changed. Violated Ellen stood up, wiped the vile entrails from her mouth, and said, “I refuse to be taken for granted”.

All of my life I’ve had a confusing sense of humility. Growing up in a minister’s family, a “Preacher’s Kid” (PK) was a very public role with high expectations of chastity, good humor, and overall exceptional behavior. We were encouraged not to fight back, to always try to reason with an aggressor, to rise above and lick our own wounds without making them known to others. After all, people looked to us for spiritual guidance, not for evidence of human failing. Of course, with all such expectations there is often a backlash.

For me, the backlash has usually been internalized anger. Inspiration is often met by a dull gray wall of resentment at not feeling able to share what drives me. I want so much for people to understand my humanness but I struggle to share it in ways that are productive and humble. Many of us do, PKs or not, lest we be considered arrogant or proud.

My neighbor said to me yesterday that she now understands why she was asked to experience the dynamic that seemed to produce constant strife with her father. It was to provide her with the tools she needed to deal with the difficult situations that present themselves today.

Her insight sparked a revelation about what happened to me last week.

After informing my client that I was unwilling to compromise the compensation we had agreed on previously, I was willing to give up the job in order to maintain my integrity. In the past, I would have said, “Of course he’s right. What was I thinking, expecting him to pay me that much? I don’t deserve it.” I would have grumbled through the job, tried to paint something life-enhancing on a dead wall and would have failed miserably.

The next day, I received a phone message. “You’re right, I’m sorry. I want you to do the job. Let’s talk.”

The gray wall that clouded the vision of my mind suddenly began to fill with color and substance. It had less to do with the client acknowledging my value than it did with ME respecting my own. I could hardly wait to get started!

I packed everything in my car again, this time including Nancy, my life-enhancing painting partner, and with agreement from the client, set out with new creative control to create a scene that we had envisioned together.

With the project complete, humility has taken on a whole new meaning for me. I realize now that it is not about hiding what makes me exceptional — I do no one any favors by feeling shame about what makes me different and special because in doing so, I only discourage them from partaking in and sharing what feeds their souls. Rather, it is about being grateful for the gifts that are offered to us, the difficult dynamics of our upbringings, the strange abilities that seem to come from nowhere, and sharing the recipes that become the feast of spirit that feeds the world.

Today I am grateful for the humiliation that brought me to this place of humility and for the upbringing that taught me how to handle it….

Taming the Beast, or, Recovering from Bougie Fever

The St. Petersburg Times ran an article in the Sunday paper about the results of the unrestricted growth that was allowed to take place in Florida over the past several years.

“Gold fever” overtook investors who bought up properties with the intent of “flipping” them and getting rich. The tide turned, the gold ran out, and what is left is a bunch of angry “miners” trying to find a place to lay the blame. Meanwhile, others who were encouraged to get into homes they couldn’t afford are living in their cars outside of the houses where they once enjoyed some comfort. The houses stand empty.

I thought about this as I ventured out into the front yard to attempt to untangle a mess that has been expanding like the bubble that burst in our economy, and as usual, it is through an encounter with nature that I’ve learned about the workings of the world.

Like the time all the plumbing in my house backed up and it was discovered that one tiny root of grass had snuck its way into the joint of an underground pipe and from there had created a massive 18-inch grass root snare. One root became two that became four, etc. I’d never really had a working understanding of the term “grass roots” as it applied to politics before then.

I had a similar revelation yesterday as I took a pair of loppers to the hideously overgrown Bouganvillea in my front yard.

If you’re not familiar with “Bougies”, they’re lush, flowering plants that grow in the south (though I recently learned that they are not native to Florida, but then, who is?). I decided it would be cool to plant one in front of the palm tree out in front for a little splash of color.

Well, this “little splash of color” turned into what my neighbor kindly described as “The Beast”. As the palm tree grew, so did the bougie, wrapping its limbs greedily around the palm trunk out there in the hot sun of the front yard, up-up-and-away from my reach. In this primo spot, it was sending out new growth daily, shooting opportunistic branches straight up to the sky, covered with massive thorns that inspired an immediate bone ache in any offended flesh (including my heel through the thin sole of my shoe – YOUCH!). My ladder, loppers, leather gloves, and even my pole saw couldn’t keep up with it.

So finally, the Bougie and I had a come-to-Jesus moment. This unrestricted growth without intention had to stop. The blossoms that made it such a thing of beauty were being choked out by the bully branches that elbowed their way up to the glorious sunlight. It was clear to me that a botanical smack-down was in order.

Carefully, I began to trim away the bottom branches I could get to without causing 3^rd-degree scratches. Little by little, as the useless inner limbs were cut away, a new form began to emerge that revealed a lovely trunk system and left only the blossom producing branches on top. Once again I could see the garden behind the tree and could even back the car out of the driveway without running over any small neighbor children.

I discovered, just as the state of Florida has, that it is only with the thoughtful management of cluttering growth that sun and air can circulate to allow a Bouganvillea, or a state, to thrive and produce vibrant blossoms. Through careful pruning and pinching, the “plant” is best able to supply nutrients to all its growth, and it is necessary sometimes to tell a branch that its expansion will neither help the whole nor add to its aesthetic impact, so it can’t grow there.

I’m not a horticulturist. In fact, if a real one reads this I’ll probably get spanked for my bad pruning technique and dirty tools. I’m also not a community builder/planner, but I do know that as I drove around this area during the boom and saw entire new neighborhoods sprouting invasively out of the earth like untamed Bougies, I knew madness would ensue and eventually we’d be left with a nearly dead plant because of an onslaught of over-eager branches.

What was gained in sacrificing the beauty of our blossoms for the sake of new growth sprawl?

Flushing Integrity

Put on your helmets people…. It’s gonna be a rough ride!

Picture this: Someone contacts you, having become aware of your work. Impressed, they would like to hire you to do a job. You put together a presentation, travel a considerable distance, provide a quote that you believe accurately reflects the time, energy, and experience that will be involved in the effort and the client says, “Let’s do it!”

You are happy that, after a period away from this work, the investment you’ve made in learning the technology that is necessary to be successful in this day and age is beginning to show some results. In anticipation of beginning this job, you go out and further invest in the clothing, materials, even childcare, that will allow you to get started.

Imagine, then, the night before you are to show up for work, the employer calls and says, “Someone just walked in, sight unseen, and offered to do the same job for half the price. Are you willing to do the job for that? I’d still rather have you do it but not if I can get someone else to do it for less.”

So what do you do? Nothing has been signed and only a smile and a handshake have sealed the deal.

In good faith I agree to the terms. Who am I to complain in an economy that is leaving people homeless? I’m  lucky to have the opportunity, I rationalize to myself.

The next morning, I walk into the building and see a toilet sitting in the middle of the entryway. Bad sign. No plumbing. Brown paper on the windows attempts to shade the heat of the Florida sun to little effect. No electricity means fumes will not be circulating. I set up anyway.

I stare at the wall and all I can see is betrayal. I roll gray, lifeless, stinky primer onto the wall. I climb to a precarious height to cover up mistakes left by a careless contractor. I have no vision for this one. It looks dead to me.

I start thinking about that toilet. I once remodeled a bathroom using a book of instructions and all the right tools and fixtures. Someone with more experience might have done a better job but nothing leaked and the room looked much better than it had before. It hadn’t taken much to become proficient at that skill.

Now, here I am about to create a 150 sq.ft. work of art that will be seen by thousands and hopefully add incentive for them to return again and again to enjoy the ambience, yet I have agreed to be paid less to do so than the young fellow listening to head banging rap music and yelling over to his contractor buddy that he has “20 beers in the fridge so the game’s at my house tonight!” for installing a sink, toilet, and mirror for the comfort of customers as required by law for such an establishment. My contribution has no such requirement.

I did not become an artist to make money. I did it because I needed to share my imagination and soul with others. Deep inside, exchanging those for money feels dirty to me, yet it is how our society has agreed to acknowledge value. In asking for an amount of money that reflected my efforts in a commercial setting, a money-making establishment, my intent had less to do with receiving compensation for myself than with attempting to assign a fair monetary value to something whose worth cannot easily be measured in dollars. I did it to assign value to the work of all artists who are willing to invest their time and souls in such a way.

As I packed up my equipment this morning and declared the birth of this project aborted, I realized that the only difference between throwing money down the toilet that would soon be in the building’s bathroom and the one that would have been my project is the fact that the literal one could actually flush…at least until it backed up from choking on all that money…

I would have signed a guarantee that the only overflowing mine would ever do would be with the light of my soul….

Technology Breakthrough

I’ve learned an important lesson about media technology lately that makes my Interactive Design degree make some sense.

If I wait around long enough and don’t touch the software, I will eventually understand how it works. It’s like the “think system” from The Music Man — if you just think about playing a musical instrument you’ll be able to!

So in addition to having created a brochure with Adobe Indesign, a logo with Adobe Illustrator, and a YouTube profile, I have now mastered the art of putting a bunch of pictures together in Apple iPhoto and hitting the button that says “slideshow” and the button that says “add music”, I can now produce a pretty cool video complete with the Ken Burns effect! VOILA!!!

I decided to try this with pictures taken during the painting of a mural in North Carolina several years ago. Having taken many pictures of the surrounding area, it makes a neat presentation about where we got our ideas from. In just 3 days, Nancy and I (and Murphy the dog!) managed to tie together a fresh light green, a deep coral, and a bold teal to create a Carolina marsh scene in keeping with the local area.

I was able to put it on Facebook — now let’s see if I can do it here. Pretty soon I’ll be working as a Genius at the Apple store….

Without further ado, check out my first foray into the world of YouTube with accompaniment from Fred Benedetti & Peter Pupping playing an instrumental version of James Taylor’s “Carolina In My Mind”….

Palliative Care for a Perception

The stench hit me the minute I opened the door. I knew that odor well.

The big yellow Labrador Retriever walked toward me with his head down, which was unusual for him. Usually he was a wacky, jumping, slobbery maniac but I think he knew that he’d messed up.

And boy, did he ever. Often when a dog has diarrhea in the house it’s fairly well confined. Not this time. It looked like old Chopper had been trying to run away from what was coming out of his butt. Several hours and many cans of Spot Shot later, the evidence was still there on the beige carpeting but the smell was better.

Such are the perils of my job as a professional pet sitter. You never know what you’ll walk in on.

Several months after this incident alerted the owners to his returning stomach cancer, I was watching the same dog but this time the owner’s father was staying at the house. Harry (known as Butch to his friends) had also been struggling with cancer for a while and was getting closer to the end, but he had insisted that the family take their planned vacation. With great trepidation they agreed, knowing that I would be there several times a day and would be able to keep and eye on him.

One night I walked in and Harry said, “I’m really sorry, but I need some help with the bathroom. I didn’t quite make it.” I told him it was no problem, telling him about the time I’d made a deal with a co-worker at the petting farm where we worked that I would clean the outhouses every day if he would deal with the chicken house. I hated working with those nasty peckers enough to be willing to haul huge buckets of human feces up the hill and dump them in a holding tank.

Harry’s mess was nothing like Chopper’s had been but the real challenge was to help without further compromising his dignity. Harry had been a proud man, a blue collar worker from upstate New York who’d worked hard all his life. That night, with his head down he sat shivering on the couch, bundled in blankets, shrunken and shriveled.

I sat down on the floor and rubbed Chopper’s belly and asked Harry about his life. He’d sat there for weeks, unable to even go to the store for cigarettes and Pepsi, humbled by his disease, so he had been taking stock of his life. His wife had died 10 years earlier and he was looking forward to seeing her again. He spoke of his son and daughter-in-law, expressing his gratitude for their generosity and his happiness that his son had found such a wonderful wife who had given birth to two beautiful children. He was beginning to let go of the things that he’d held true that really hadn’t been important, resentments and misguided ideals that had kept him separate from people. Suddenly, those things just didn’t matter anymore.

I stayed for a little while, got him some more Pepsi and prepared the coffee maker for morning, but I didn’t plug it in — Harry’s fireman buddy had once told him that the #1 cause of house fires was appliances. I carried the teeming bag of adult diapers out as I left.

About a month later, I got a call inviting me to join in a memorial service for Harry out in the family’s back yard by the lake. When I arrived there, his son was distracting himself by throwing a giant chunk of firewood for crazy Chopper to chase. Harry had raised a kind, strong son, a real bear of a man. It was hard to believe that the tiny fellow I’d met could have been his father.

A display of pictures sat on a table and I looked for Harry. Because I hadn’t known him before he was sick, I didn’t recognize him at first. When I realized which one he was, I saw that he had been a huge, virile man like his son.

In the pictures I realized how extraordinary that last conversation had been. This was not a contrite looking man. That expression did not suffer fools easily. This was a “man’s man” in every sense of the word. But his last words with me were like a flower opening. A level of love and appreciation that I don’t think he had an easy time sharing with those closest to him flowed from his heart. I felt privileged to have borne witness.

In the aftermath of this experience, I got thinking about volunteering for Hospice, but as is my track record with carrying out such ideas, I have yet to do it. But as I remember this story I realize that in a sense, I am already a Hospice volunteer. I am working to ease the transition of a way of thinking that is in its final stages, trying to listen to people as they thrash with fear at the idea of their perceptions dying. I’m trying to be patient.

Our country is changing in such a way that as new life emerges, another has to end. We’re working through the stages of grief:

Denial — this is the way things are, this is how they’ve always been and they’ll never change…

Anger — what do you mean, things are changing? I refuse to let them change!

Bargaining – if I stand up and shake my fist, will you make sure things don’t change?

Depression – everything I thought I knew is different now. I don’t recognize anything.

Acceptance – things have changed, but they’re okay. I don’t feel any different, and now I have nothing more to fear.

In less than 250 years, our country has grown and multiplied many times over with a population that gets less recognizable to many every day. New languages, new religions, new philosophies “threaten” to change the fabric that many of our citizens believe our nation to be woven from.

But the broadcloths of our founders have over the years been replaced by any number of textiles as we take advantage of the amazing freedoms of opportunity and experimentation that America has to offer those who represent its threads. We have woven entirely new communities made up of a myriad of constituents only to discover that we’ve created amazing new garments, techni-colored dreamcoats!

Still, there are those who prefer the unwieldy broadcloth, the stiff materials that impede their movements and confine their spirits.

I had watched as Harry, nested deep inside the soft synthetic comforter on the couch, shed the rigid garments of his life and laid his soul bare before me. A spirit that had been so firmly bound for so many years was finally becoming free as he found in me a gentle willingness to listen as he let go of his burdens.

In my memories of that night I found a compassion not just for the literally dying, but a tenderness for the symbolically dying — those among us who are struggling to let go of a life that no longer serves them or others.

Old Chopper, the yellow lab, finally surrendered his willful exuberance for life soon after Harry did. Evidence of his “explosion” lingered for months afterward in the fibers of the carpet, almost as a coarse reminder of the indelible spirit in all of us that refuses to be permanently eradicated from the fabric that has made our country what it is, but it offered also a pungent reminder of the less pleasant parts of our history that we have managed to mostly scrub away.

Harry and Chopper, you’ll probably never know the impact you had in those last days of your lives, but in sharing and letting go of your greatest vulnerabilities, your spirits continue to make the world a stronger place.

Inertia and the Hell of Being a Man

Help me out here, people.

I’m finding my mind whirling as I try to figure out the best direction for our country.

You too? Imagine that…

I’m really starting to understand the adage about not talking about politics or religion because it’s a no-win proposition. You either find people who agree with you, hang out with them and preach to each other’s choir, or you turn blue in frustration trying to convince someone else that your ideas are valid. Eventually you reach an impasse and everything comes to a halt.

But the one thing I try to do when I disagree with or don’t quite understand someone is to step into their shoes for a time and see the world through their eyes.

Lately, I’ve been trying to understand what it is to be a man in our society right now. I read a disturbing statistic recently that the rate of suicide for men between the ages of 45 and 54 has risen substantially in the past few years. I’ve seen it played out in my own life with two old high school classmates taking their own lives in the past 3 months.

Before I was 12, I was convinced that I’d grow up to be a man. At that time it seemed that everything good in the world was only available to men. I was disappointed when I found out I was ineligible, but now I feel like I was given a get-out-of-jail-free card. Being a man is not an easy ride these days, and our society, like men’s biology, hasn’t done a very good job of equipping them emotionally for a crash.

I chose to leave the corporate working world about 7 years ago because I could. My needs were few and I felt that I could make up for it in more creative ways. So far, I have. But as I watch what is happening to those who did not make that same choice but are experiencing the same outcome makes me wonder how I can help them.

There is a powerful force in the universe called “inertia” — the principle that “an object in motion will stay in motion”, which makes its inverse also true.

As men lose their jobs in the workforce, sometimes for years at a time, their internal engines grind to a stop. I have experienced this phenomenon for myself, by choice, and I understand how hard it is to get moving again. What seems so simple when you are already in motion is exponentially harder when the wheels have yet to find their momentum. For many men, the only velocity is “full speed ahead” so a dead stop can be devastating.

You work your butt off for years to fulfill all the responsibilities you thought were expected of you, raising a family by selling the best part of your life force to someone who one day calls you in and says, “I’m sorry. Through no fault of your own, we have to let you go.” Just like that. The most powerful years of your life dissipate in a puff of smoke, your contributions soon forgotten by everyone you knew.

After the initial devastation subsides and you scramble for your footing, you think, “Hey, maybe now I can pursue that dream I thought I’d never have a chance to explore” even though you put it aside so long ago you have to think hard to remember what it was. Grandiosely you imagine that maybe this is God’s timing and you’re being told to pursue it, so you get started.

But you’re tired now. Middle-age has doused the fire in your engine and you’re lucky if it still has some burning embers capable of igniting this new fuel you’ve stumbled on. You wonder if your dream was a calling or if it was merely the incendiary energy of youth. You grow desperate as you try to figure out what to do and each passing day puts you further behind. Your mind blurs as you try to accomplish even the simplest tasks of taking care of your household (often a foreign concept) or sending out a resume that you know will probably be lost in a stack with thousands of others.

It seems as if nobody wants or needs you. Maybe your kids are grown, your wife has established her own rhythm in your absence or in her own career. She probably gets to keep her job as that “what-goes-around-comes-around” backlash hits because she makes less money for doing the same job. The one thing that made you feel worthy in the world — your work — doesn’t even need you anymore and you’re lucky if you’ve prepared for this time financially.

You…are…DESPERATE!!!

And then it finally happens… You fall to your knees, crying, begging for relief from this pain. Maybe you think you’d be more valuable to your family if you just weren’t here anymore, that maybe you can figure out a way to cash in on your life insurance so they won’t be left with nothing. You rationalize that having money is more valuable to them than having you.

You feel relief. You have a plan! Everything seems great because your inertia has broken and you can move forward! That fire in your belly starts to ignite and you feel alive again!

Oh, the irony…. that the “promise” of hell can be so seductive. I’m not a big believer in hell as a place in eternity. I believe it is right here and we live it now. But what we don’t realize is that hell is not the painful part of our existence. Rather, it’s in the premature release; the thought that a simple action can end our suffering forever. It’s the very hell our country finds itself confronting as it deals with having fallen prey to the seduction of the “easy way out”.

At the risk of sounding spiritually trite, maybe there is something to being driven to our knees in desperation. Maybe it’s God’s way of saying, “I’ve taken away your legs so that I can teach you to walk again, on my terms, not yours…” If we stop struggling and stay there long enough to muster the courage to dry our tears and look around from that vantage point, we may find that the view down there is completely different, that maybe we are seeing a world that most people won’t humble themselves enough to look at.

Maybe THIS is a glimpse into the heaven in our own life knowing that we can learn to walk again one step at a time as our new, stronger legs form.

Dear, sweet men…. we ask so much of you…. that you be strong and courageous, that you never show us your defeat. Have we asked too much, or have we simply asked of you the wrong things? The rest of us have won our right, at your expense, to change and to fulfill our own longings…. but in doing so, have we denied you yours?

Day of Atonement

Today is Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, the holiest day of the year for religious Jews. It is the big finale of the High Holy Days and is observed by a 25-hour period of fasting and intensive prayer.

I can report this only because I Googled it. In my search, I realized how incredibly ignorant I am about Judaism.

I say this with some dismay because when I was a little tyke, I lived in a predominantly Jewish area on Long Island, NY, so many of my elementary school classmates were Jewish.

One of my first memories of Judaism was that most of my classmates got to miss school on the High Holy Days while three or four of us attended class and got to do “independent study”. Needless to say, I was resentful.

Then came Hannukah and the eight days of presents my friends would show up with at school. With eight kids in my family, I was lucky to get one….ON Christmas day.

So here I am, some 30-40 years later realizing that I’ve never really taken the time to learn about Judaism. Heck, I’ve barely tried to learn about Christianity, so I guess that’s not saying much. But as I peeked around on the Google site, I realized I really know BUPKIS about anything Hebrew!

I do know that it is bad form for a non-Jew to display a menorah during the holidays (those other days around the Christian celebration of You-Know-Who’s birth), but I am baffled about how we are supposed to acknowledge (or not) the High Holy Days.

So if I say that this is my Day of Atonement to my Jewish friends for not having taken the time to understand the significance of this day to them, I hope I am not stepping on any toes.

Shalom, and have an easy fast….

Marion Loguidice

“Transcendental girl” (pictured at left) hasn’t had much to say lately. I guess it’s time to call her out again…..

I got “friended” on Facebook the other day by a woman who took advantage of our mutual connection to Caroline Myss as a way to promote her music. At first I thought, how brazen of her to use this as a means of self-promotion, but then I thought, how clever! And I realized that I, in fact, have done the same thing in the past.

Marion Loguidice wrote in her message that Caroline had given her the push she needed to get out there and share herself and her music with the world. I had once received a similar shove , so I could appreciate the significance and it gave me a different sense of Marion’s motivations.

So without further ado, check out this gorgeous bit of singing and songwriting. Congratulations, Marion, and I wish you the best of success in sharing your soul with the world!

Do I Suck at Being an American or Am I Just Like Everyone Else?

I’m thinking about having a Tea Party. Not the kind that has become so popular lately, where rage-filled people gather to protest and metaphorically “throw the tea overboard” like the days of old in Boston Harbor….

I’m talking about a real tea party with little china cups, tea of all varieties, and a group of people from all walks of American life simply sitting down on comfortable chairs and pillows and talking about our various perceptions of what’s going on and trying to find our connections again.

My psyche feels overwhelmed by the hostility in our country. Even if not expressed openly, it feels like it’s hiding just below the surface ready to burst open like a pus-filled infection. Sorry for the gross simile, but it seems to be getting worse with each passing day and our health care system has mysteriously mutated into this psychic maze that we can’t seem find our way through to get an antibiotic to treat it. It feels like a self-induced anxiety nightmare.

And I have no idea where I stand. Am I alone in feeling this?

An old friend and I had a slightly heated exchange over an ostensibly patriotic email she sent a while back that just rubbed me the wrong way. The most difficult part for me was that I didn’t disagree with the intent, but rather, the presentation. Basically, “if you’re not with us, you’re against us…” It made patriotism a partisan concept.

My friend responded, telling me that she grew up with strong work values, and though she is not a church-goer, she was raised with “Christian” principles. I already knew this about her, yet these days the rhetoric that goes along with such admirable ethics clangs like a gong in my brain and drowns out what I know to be good and pure and gracious about my fellow countrypeople.

This morning when I received my application to become a part of the:

DISADVANTAGED MINORITY/DISADVANTAGED WOMEN
BUSINESS ENTERPRISE PROGRAM

I found myself in a different consciousness: that of my more conservative self.

This program would qualify me to bid on mural painting jobs within the local school system but with an unfair advantage. Even though I am only one person (sometimes two, if Nancy helps) I qualify as a woman-owned business and that gives me minority status.

WHAT?? How does the fact that I am a woman put me at a disadvantage as an artist? Why should anything but my merits count toward my qualifications? Why don’t you look at my portfolio and see what I’ve done and THEN decide whether you want to give me the job or not instead of letting me cut in line?

But then, doesn’t that logic put me in line with the liberal feminists? Equal pay for equal work?

And then there’s the paperwork. In order for me to doodle on the walls of an elementary school hallway, I must provide reams of bureaucratic information in order for the government to investigate whether I am worthy.

Doesn’t that put me in line with the conservatives who want less government interference?

I am reminded of the time I walked into my local bank in Vermont where I’d been personally depositing my paychecks every week for years. I enjoyed going in and chatting up the tellers on a Friday afternoon. They had just built a big new bank building and decided they now needed to start checking IDs every time someone came in to make a transaction. Tellers who’d waited on me forever suddenly claimed not to recognize me when I failed to produce my license, which I rarely carried with me. I was LIVID and fired off a 3-page letter to the bank president.

Maybe that’s what’s going on here. Maybe, like me, people are starting to feel cut off from a society that once recognized them, that slapped them on the back and gave a big handshake when they showed up in the bank lobby to contribute to the local lending institution so their neighbors could build their lives and find reason to get up each day in order to honor their debts. A small town where everybody knew who the plumber was, the veterinarian, the pharmacist… They didn’t really know anybody’s background and didn’t really care. They simply trusted each other’s integrity.

That’s why I’m having a tea party. The world has become too big and unmanageable for my mind to comprehend. I need to reconnect with the strong values I know to be so deeply held by my friends and neighbors.

Mostly, I need to rediscover my own. Chamomile, anyone?