christmas cheer

peace on earth

Snow falls steadily outside. The deep silence calms me. I just got in a fight with my husband, but now everything is quiet. I breathe. I come to terms with the fact that there will be no resolution. He maintained his integrity. I suppose I maintained mine as well by expressing as honestly as I could my own feelings, though I’m left with mild sadness.

What I want to share with him, I may never share. Our limits touch each other, and we can go no further. One of those things you give up once you get married, I guess.

Peace on earth. My sister commented last night that this is the least sacred Christmas we have had. I suppose it comes as a result of all our years of complaining. This year we didn’t get dragged to church or communion. We didn’t have to read the Christmas story. We didn’t have to listen to (much) contemporary Christian Christmas music. We didn’t have to say one thing we were thankful for. And I think in a way, we kind of missed it, though we might not admit it to my mom.

A text message this morning woke me up saying “how God loves us” – a beautiful reminder. This is perhaps underneath everything: the love of God, so deep, so silent, so present. Enveloping the world in stillness. Comfort. Peace.

For one day, we think of loved ones around the world. We pay attention to loved ones close by. We let our hearts rest. And the entire world rejoices. Conflicts may not resolve, but something deeper takes over.

the audacity to hope

I read an article last week that was discussing the dichotomy in our society between “passionate authenticity” and medicated happiness. On one hand, our society prizes authenticity and defines authenticity as unrestrained, deep, “passionate” emotion. Most importantly, we attach this passionate authenticity with a prophet-artist, who has the ability to see – and feel – beyond the mundane layers of life, revealing what is below the surface. On the other hand, we feel that if we can't possess this passionate authenticity, the next best step is medicated happiness, artificially induced.

This prizing of passionate authenticity gets complicated when dealing with depression. On one hand the prophet-artists argue that this is a necessary part of experiencing all dimensions of life and bears an intrinsic relationship to creativity and ecstasy. On the other hand, the medical community has argued that this is a false system of thinking that debilitates individuals by preventing them from accepting the help they need, especially through medication. The author of the article wonders if there is somehow a third way…something other than using “passionate authenticity” or medicated happiness as the measure of wholeness.

I’m reflecting on all of this as I sit in my parent’s house in Leavenworth with a pot of tea and snow falling gently outside. I’m not sure I totally buy this argument – or rather I’m left dissatisfied with the author who outlines these two poles, shows the problem with each, and then leaves the reader without any clue as to what this third way might be practically in the here and now.

Whatever the case, I had a conversation with a friend yesterday and we were discussing depression, pain, addiction, identity. I remember coming to a point last year where I realized that on some level, I was resisting healing, forgiveness, integration because I was holding onto pain (and victimization) as a core part of my identity. For so long, pain felt like the most “real” and “raw” emotion that I had, and I was encouraged to tap into that. I think that process was important, but at some point a subtle and seductive myth takes over – and that is that pain defines us. We need it as part of our identity.

I think this myth is all the more seductive by the relationship we draw in our society between pain and creativity or life-force. Most critically popular art right now is prized for its authentic representations of pain, suffering, and victimization. I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve been equally drawn to this type of art. I’m inclined to believe that as humans we need these representations to help us recognize the suffering of the “other” in our own suffering, to draw humanity together, and to help humans come to terms with a broken world.

But I guess recently, I’ve been questioning all this once again as I've realized my desire to hold onto darkness as if it is the only true and fixed thing I know about myself is still alive. This notion of self can be intimately tied to Christian notions of sin – original sin – and it fits nicely with systems that emphasis the persistent and constant presence of evil, darkness, suffering in the world. It also fits in well with secular versions that see existence as nothing but raw struggle and pain as essentially part of our existence.

But the question again is: does pain define us, individually and collectively? I really don’t think this essentialist position is consistent with Christianity. While we have pain – and suffering, evil, injustice is present in the world – our faith teaches us that this is not the beginning. The source of our identity does not begin in pain. It begins in the goodness and beauty of God. It's important to note also that creativity does not begin with pain. It begins in the act of giving life and light piercing the darkness.

Pain does bind humans together. However, we should not confuse this as categorically defining humanity nor should we prize pain for this quality. This creates grievous glamorizations of pain, suffering and violence – often instigated by those who claim that this is the most “authentic” mode of human life. More defining it seems is our response to pain – our own or others – with compassion, with a reaffirmation of life, with healing, with justice. This reaffirms the reality of goodness that is at the core of all things.

So where does all this leave me? Free to let go of the need to prize darkness as the most “authentic” or “real” part of myself. Doing so releases the power pain holds over me and breaks its seductive myth. And something strange happens. Far from taking something essentially me away, I discover a deeper sense of self. Free from the power of pain, I can question and imagine different possibilities for myself and the world as I journey prayerfully towards hope, life, and light without denying the presence of pain in my life. I can affirm healing, redemption, and forgiveness. I can also take Zoloft without feeling guilty or ashamed.

The Scriptures speak of the end of time and the revelation of true reality not as being characterized by violence, pain and suffering as some gleefully imagine, but as a place where every tear will be wiped away, where swords will be beaten into plough shares, and humanity will live joyfully in the light nourished and sustained by love. Nations will be healed. Wars will cease. Disease will be no more. Our challenges today is to live out this vision prophetically, to affirm this vision in the here and now, and to believe in it as defining, ultimately the first and last word of all of human history and of our lives.

I admit that this is sometimes hard for me to swallow. I’m suspicious of any narrative that proposes deliverance from pain and suffering because it seems irrelevant and dangerous in a world of pain and suffering. But the path of faith is to embrace this as reality as we question our own. Doing so – at the very least - breaks the seductive myth and endless cycle of pain and violence. Breaking this myth doesn’t remove pain in the here and now. It just helps us see it more clearly by destroying its power. It helps us see it as something we have agency in response to and calls us to work and walk towards peace, justice, life, healing, and hope. For lack of better analogy, faith puts pain and hope on an equal playing field and asks us to choose what is more compelling, what will have the most enduring claim on us and our world. Faith forces confrontation with the most enduring forces of human life: dignity and depravity and prompts us to choose the final word. Perhaps the “third way” is recognizing that both forces our present in our world and within our own self. Both the narrative of pain and the narrative of hope in some way shape and define us, and yet the question today and every day is what will we hold onto as enduring and what will we release as myth? What narrative will we decide has claim on us, our world, our families, and our relationships, and which claims will we resist?

Christmas is here

Last night Than and I celebrate our first Christmas in Texas.
A neighbor gave us this little fake tree, which we decorated.


Topping the tree is Stingy - the sting ray Than made me at the Chicago aquarium last Christmas. Stingy is usually stuck to our living room wall, but he balances nicely on top of the tree.

Our three ornaments.

Light in the darkness.

race matters

Barack Obama, South Africa, and Race

Reading this recent story about a professor at Calvin College, I am struck with how much we still don’t “get it” when it comes to race, culture, and faith in this country. Calvin insists that all of their professors be Reformed, but faculty member Denise Isom has struggled to find a reformed community where she feels comfortable racially and culturally, event though every other (white) faculty member has this luxury. So faced with this choice, she decided to voice – very convincingly – her reasons for attending a Baptist church and asked for an exception to the requirement. Calvin refused this request citing maintenance of their institutional faith identity. If Isom refuses to attend a Reformed church, she will be taken off her tenure track and given a one year contract after which she will be terminated.

This is outrageous – especially, when the university simultaneously claims to be pursuing diversity. Calvin already is 97% white, and I guarantee that the few students of color who are there depend heavily on faculty members like Isom. Isom’s letter could have been an opportunity for Calvin as an institution to stare deeply at itself – to question why people of color do not feel comfortable in reformed communities and perhaps in their institution. Instead of approaching her concerns with sensitivity and inquiry, they responded with a defensive expression of their own institutional identity, which appears to have no room for the particularities of people of color.

What makes me sad about this incident is that reading between the lines of Isom’s letter reveals a story I have heard all too often behind closed doors. I’m not sure when we – white people – are going to get it. It’s mentally, physically, spiritually, emotionally exhausting to be a minority representative in a majority culture. Isom already has to play the culture game five days a week absorbing and translating white, reformed, culture while at the same time being viewed as a symbol who speaks on behalf of all African Americans. This sounds like a job she was more than willing to do, and at the same time, she needed respite. While white liberals often extol the multicultural church, I’ve seen up close the absolute need for students/faculty/staff of color to identify with their own communities; it’s a question of survival.

I wish that white people would take the time to hear stories – and pleas – like Isom’s, and stare deeply into our own practices and institutions. Sadly, too often we disregard these stories. And then we wonder why we can’t diversify our institutions. Why the token faculty member of color burns out and leaves. When stories like Isom’s surface – I can’t help but think: it’s so obvious! I applaud her for having the courage to articulate so publicity a reality that is often only shared in hallways and behind closed doors. Unfortunately, her prophetic voice has gone unheeded. It remains to be seen if public opinion will be enough to prompt a reexamination by Calvin. I doubt it. They have said in clear terms that what is at stake here is identity itself: the particular vs. the universal – and in this battle, the universal (white) has won.

Orientalism Revisited

Here are the results of my recent foray into Christmas cookie swapping. After four hours of baking, I emerged with several dozen gingersnaps I could actually use!

books, coffee, god, profit

If you are interested in theory and design, check out this project. A gothic church has been converted into a bookstore, but what I find most interesting is the range of comments and responses to the project.

Initially, I responded to the aesthetics, but after a moment, I realized there is much more to contemplate in this intersection of sacred and secular.

We pass this billboard every time we drive to Dallas.

blowing in the wind

It’s been a long time since I have posted. Partially, the long absence is because I have been busy. Since my last post, I’ve made two trips to Dallas and one trip to Seattle/Hawaii. I had plenty of ideas for posts along the way, but they never quite make it to written form in time to be relevant.

I’m finally starting to feel settled here. I’m starting to care about this place, and I find myself wondering what’s going to happen once I leave. I feel invested in my job. I have been invited to a cookie swap next weekend. The homemade glittery invitation sits on my desk.

It’s a bit disconcerting when the present gradually replaces the past, when I realize that my life is here and I have moved from one stage into another. What this stage is, I’m not sure, but no doubt, I will look back and perhaps it will make sense. I feel a bit ageless at the moment: not young, not old, not sure, but not conflicted either. It’s so different from the last two years.

I am obsessively following Barack Obama’s campaign. I don’t feel like I can place all my hope in one election, one man – but change feels possible. That the world could change through a shift in perspective blows my mind, but I know it’s possible. And what I like about Obama is that he has the courage to imagine a better world, without denying the reality of its complexity. I’m tired of people mistaking such vision for inexperience because they themselves cannot fathom a different world. They are so wedded to a world built on fear, security, and dominance, that it is unthinkable to tear it down.

But history has a way of playing tricks. bringing the mountains to the ground. So, I guess at the moment I’m banking on that more than anything else. And though I’m not sure when it appeared, hope has arrived. Hope that although everything our hands touch dies, love will still keep us alive. Yes, AIDS is still here. Bombs are still exploding. Wars still rage. But, today I feel hopeful.

Are you a phoney liberal?

Very engaging and thought provoking article about liberalism, feminism and Islam...
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article2701379.ece

contemplating academia

It occurs to me this morning that when I am really honest, I don’t want to leave academia. I have contemplated many possibilities that would allow me access to academia, but afford me the “real” world status I crave. I’ve tried to align myself in such a way that I can have access to the benefits of academia without the privileged and elitist trappings. However, I know that I need the academic community to push my thinking and my own personal development.

This is the first time that I am experiencing a partial cutting off. I am away from my mentors. I am away from the stream of ideas that nourished me. And I am devoid of inspiration and creativity. I wanted this challenge. I wanted this because I wanted to separate the chaff from the wheat. I wanted to experiment – to test myself in an environment where I was not receiving constant feeding and constant praise. I imagined exhilarating freedom – “space” to read, write, think according to my own tastes. But I find it increasingly difficult to find meaning in the texts and ideas I love, when I have no one to converse with, no way to see them in particle application, no controversy, no debate, no collaboration.

In Seattle, it is possible to create and access this community outside of its established walls. There are friends, book groups, coffee shops etc. The post-college community was a nice nesting place. And because of my job, I still had access to professors, mentors, lectures. Beyond that, I had integration of theory and practice: I was involved in learning, student support, justice, activism, and cross-cultural interactions in a way that felt just as meaningful as what went on inside the classroom. It was delightful experimentation. But perhaps that was because I was still intimately connected to the classroom.

Now, I glean what I can through my husband. I live by proxy. I enjoy this, but I know that I will never be satisfied until I take responsibility for myself, take myself seriously. This gap or divide I feel between us will only grow with the years, unless I am feeling as if I am equally pursuing what I feel called to do, exercising to their fullest my gifts, abilities, and skills and confronting/challenging my limits. I know that living vicariously through Than will only result in long-term resentment, especially if it is a result of my own fear, ambivalence, and laziness.

Do I feel ready, then, to work, to take a chance, to discipline myself? Do I feel ready to sacrifice? Do I feel ready to engage in passionate pursuit? I would be a fool to squander this opportunity. I have the opportunity to trade in possibility for a concrete choice; I have the opportunity to pursue graduate school (though whether I make it in is a different story). Still, while I am caught in this internal struggle, I realize that I am moving closer to taking the first concrete step: conquering the GRE.

I recognize that there may be no right path, but when asked a year ago if I would rather be an academic or an activist, I answered a resounding and immediate “academic.” I already see myself as an academic. I see myself devoting my life to teaching and study. I love what happens in the classroom. I love the unique opportunity for transformation, for learning both on the part of student and teacher. I love the freedom that comes through the conversation of ideas. And I know that to arrive at this point of freedom requires limit and labor. As much as I resist the limitations of the academic life, I also crave its freedom.

I am closer to accepting that freedom and limitation, vocation and work, come together. It’s similar to the choice of marriage. One can’t rush the decision making process, but at the same time one cannot avoid being confronted with the existential choice to step into the unknown and risk for the sake of love. Making this choice (and living it out) is not always the romantic process one envisions: it is full of confrontation and struggle as one trades in hypothetical possibilities and fantasies for the concrete joys and risks, tensions and limitations of one relationship, one discipline, one love.

Mathematics

Six years later, I remember why I used to like numbers. Not really numbers, I guess, but the process. Equations are about discovering the unknown, and I loved this mystery: x. y. z. The symbol never represents what is behind it – an unknown value that controls everything – it only holds the space. The variable (x, y, z, b…) only signals substance, but what substance it is has yet to be discovered and named. And sometimes when arrive at the end of the process you realize it cannot and will not be uncovered.

I enjoy the process even when I get it wrong; experimentation is satisfying in itself, and who is to say that there is one right answer. It seems valid enough to come to a conclusion by process. Even if it is not the “right” conclusion, it is one conclusion, one possibility. Besides, the numbers all feel arbitrary anyway: defined only by the relations created as my pen moves across the page. Line relates to line, number to crossed out scratches. It makes sense in the moment, but when I look back, it can hardly be deciphered. The above probably explains why I didn’t go into the sciences: precision is beyond me. But I never saw numbers as facts.

I have the most trouble when dealing with cold hard rules. Lines and angles. Parameters and squares. Circumference and angles. Velocity and density. There’s no room for approximation or substitution here. I enjoy equations and fractions that require flipping, erasing, substituting, moving – forming a mental and literal dance as it moves down the page. Of course, lines and angles require equations too, but it’s all too concrete for me.

I miss the old days when I had to turn in a proof. Then, at least, I was forced to be logical, to follow step after step. To trace every shift, every line, every substitution, ever addition, every side multiplication. To get it right. For now, I still have a ways to go. My left brain hasn’t had to work this hard in years.

Desmond Tutu banned from American University

funny and sad

"I'm an evangelical with a capital E. I hesitate to make such a confession, for I am painfully aware of the baggage the label carries. Without wanting to blame Americans for all the problems of the world, it is, well, largely their fault."Joel Edwards, president of the Evangelical Alliance U.K.(Source: The Times)

today

Life is funny. Do the stories we tell ourselves eventually come true?
Or maybe somehow our lives become stories. All I know is that I feel helpless, caught in a film, watching a train wreck that I knew somehow was going to happen.

In my family, the narrative has always been defensive. Protect what you have, work hard to establish yourself, preserve, fight, struggle, because the world is out to beat you, to strip you, to destroy you. It is perilous, back breaking, bone wasting work. My father’s pessimism combines with my mother’s spiritual idealism: it’s not a new narrative. And today I feel angry – almost blame them – because what they always feared, always lived, always breathed, becomes true.

But what of compassion? Did they create this world or are they merely responding to a world, cruel and unjust? I wonder because the world I know has constant pain, and there’s nothing to do but hold it sometimes, let it sit in your stomach until it becomes part of you. I’m only 24 years old, but I wonder how you live 70 years without becoming broken or hard, without fearing the world or escaping.

This is not really a commentary about my family, but rather about me. My struggle to reject this narrative, to stay rooted in reality – to hold the pain, anger, helplessness – without feeling the need to protect myself or escape, to trust that my heart is able to hold all this because my heart is held inside a love that is bigger, deeper, wider, than all the pain of the world. And will this story save me? Will it preserve me, nourish me, sustain me? There’s no way to no for sure. But in the end, I feel less inclined to judge than I used to. Mercy triumphs over judgment. May it be true. That’s all I can pray.


Song of the Day: Jon Vanderslice - Kookaburra.

blackwater baby

As I was mindlessly checking the campus announcements this week, I was shocked to find that the Vice-Chairman of Blackwater would be speaking. So, yesterday, I locked my office and headed over to the Behavioral Science building wondering if anyone would have the courage to address or was aware of Blackwater’s recent fame. After a fascinating trajectory on counterterrorism and 9/11, Black took questions. The closest we came to touching Blackwater was a student inquiring about his involvement with the company. I didn’t say anything. Being new to LCU, I decided that this wasn’t the setting to expose my own political views.

The visited class was a criminal justice course. Most of the students are going into law enforcement. Some Homeland Security. A visiting academic asked if any had considered international service. No one responded. He then commented that West Texas is the hardest region of the United States to recruit people for international service. No one wants to leave.

I think it is this underlying lack of desire to know or care about the rest of the world that is hardest about being here. Often it’s not intentional or even conscious, but some Texans literally feel as if Texas is America. There is no need even to venture out of state lines, let alone outside of the country. I can’t really blame some for this attitude, and I definitely do not want to cast a negative stereotype on all Texans. However, for many, there entire lives are rooted in this region. It requires significant feats of imagination or exposure to other culture to push people outside their cultural framework – and these types of experiences are hard to come by. Movement beyond Texas also requires in some ways a renunciation of one’s particular loyalties, and in a region of the country that is so deeply fed by such loyalties, the choice to leave can be agonizing and alienating.


Living in Texas has had the opposite effect for me. It has ignited a fierce desire to stay in touch with the rest of the world. In the words of President Eaton to “know what’s going on in the world” (I never thought I would be quoting Eaton, but it’s the first thing that came to mind). Awareness has never felt more necessary – especially when information is so inaccessible. I don’t know what I would do without the internet portal to independent news sources. However, I still feel so defeated, so far away. Awareness is only one step, and what good does it really do to intellectually engage with what is going on in the world, when everything feels so far away. And what about the needs of this community? I’m struggling to reconcile my particular location with the needs and issues that weigh heavy on my mind and heart nationally and globally: the war in Iraq, human rights abuses, Sudan, Palestine, US foreign policy, racism in America, displaced peoples.

One of the most inspiring aspects of this last week – for now – is the protests in Burma. Perhaps along with the rest of the world, I am holding my breath. Praying that this will be a triumph of peace and justice, hoping that this will not turn into violence and repression. We’ll see.

Accounts from Burma

Turning the Page

Barak Obama's Plan for Iraq

"The President would have us believe there are two choices: keep all of our troops in Iraq or abandon these Iraqis. I reject that choice. We cannot continue to put this burden on our troops alone. I'm tired of this notion that we either fight foolish wars or retreat from the world. We are better than that as a nation. "

Thoughts?

African-Anglican-Suburban-American Dance

Very Interesting

The Bitter Truth of Iraq

This article pretty much sums up my feelings on the current situation in Iraq. I've thought it over many times and because of the vulnerable situation of Iraqi civilians, I can't bring myself to back the political rhetoric of immediate withdrawal, despite my opposition to the war. I believe the American people have a responsibility to recognize our complicity in creating the violent, chaotic and destructive situation in Iraq, and thus an ethical duty towards the restoration and rebuilding of Iraq, while somehow respecting and recognizing Iraqi sovereignty. I find much of the Democratic rhetoric around immediate withdrawal as completely self-absorbed, self-aggrandizing, and nationalistic as the rhetoric on the right. I am infuriated by those on the right and left who are frustrated with the government in Iraq and feel as if it is our right to call for a regime change or "timely" improvement as if Iraq is America's plaything (it's just not working out like we planned, what happened?). It's also convenient scapegoating. And since the beginning of this war, the cost has always been most deeply to the Iraqi people. I don't know what the course should be for the future, but I do think we owe it to the Iraqi people to listen to their needs and support them at all costs in meeting these needs. I believe that fundamentally, most Iraqis want what most human beings want: security and stability without the constant threat of violence. I know our occupation of Iraq incites violence, but I can't help but think that if we withdrew now the level of violence would be catastrophic. My analysis is probably biased in its own way, and incredible naive...but that's why I value news stories that actually try to report the story of Iraq from the perspective of those who live there because in almost all political debates, this perspective is absent.

If you know of more ways to hear these voices, please let me know.

Still Lost

“Commemoration provides interpretation; it offers a public meaning that survives the event. It surpasses private experience and continues to provide significance even when memory is long gone. Commemoration is not a matter of healing or feeling; it is a matter of meaning.”

It is September 11. I am a feeling the same way I felt the last few years – vaguely sad, but intentionally disconnected. Six years later, I still do not know how to interpret this day, and apparently the American public doesn’t either. For the most part, those of us removed from the east coast seem so ambivalent we almost go out of our way not to observe the day. Then there is the uneasy and permanent tie with Iraq ironically represented by the Petraeus hearings in the Senate today. Feelings on the war in Iraq and Afghanistan cloud memory and shift interpretation. And I feel guilty.

I received an email today asking me to pray for peace and send my prayer to Congress in a “surge of prayers” that will be read out loud during the Iraq hearings. Trouble is I can’t fathom what it really means to pray. I am disturbed as I hear the reports of the hearings trickling in. Of course, I want peace. I am committed to peace intuitively and theologically. But on days like today, I have no idea what peace really looks like or accomplishes. And I am uncomfortable with prayer being used as a political tool when I can’t even understand what it means for me to pray. And I feel guilty.

So, I guess I’m wondering where the process of grief, the politics of justice, and the reality of war intersect. As much as I deplore the current war, I don’t know how to also appropriately acknowledge and respond to the grief, loss and sorrow of those who suffered on Sept. 11. It is easy to be cynical or sarcastic given the disproportionate loss of life resulting from the wars. It’s also all too easy to self-blame as this New York Times article points out.

So, I end up disconnecting because I can’t figure out what’s “appropriate” to feel: guilt, apathy, sorrow, heaviness, weariness, cynicism, hopelessness, sarcasm, self-blame, outrage, anger, quiet meditation? And can a prayer for peace or justice really hold all of these? Whose justice? Whose peace? And yet, this ongoing violence must end. We are – I am – too easily blinded by its logic.

Six years later, I still feel lost, still feel loss. I wish it were as simple as “peace” – but in this political economy, I can’t grasp its currency; it offers no guidance or grounding. I find myself grappling with uncomfortable questions and realities about the nature of war, violence, and loss, but there are no easy answers. I’m not sure we are ever going to know how to commemorate once the memories and emotions slip away and fade. This seems to be our current struggle, or at least it is my struggle, as I search for meaning in the absence of emotion and my own ambivalence.

The Lone Star State

(This is a bit late: I apologize)

I’ve survived a week in Texas, and truth be told it hasn’t been that hard. I’m settling into the heat and daily giving thanks for air conditioning and welcoming the rain with a knowing smile because it somehow brings comfort. I still don’t entirely know why I am here, but I do feel taken care of.

Next week, Than begins his graduate program, and the school I work at begins classes. I’m anxious to get a sense of this place and its people: cultures and customs. I think I understand why “middle-America” sometimes seems so insular. I don’t think Texas technically qualifies as middle-America, but in my mind I equate the two. Anyway, there is something about being landlocked in the middle of dessert and miles of fields that just makes you forget about the rest of the world. All you really need to know is where the nearest store, gas station, and church are. I’ve met so many people whose radius of knowledge by choice or circumstance is 100 miles. It’s a bit endearing (although this is still probably part of my own cultural bias) – generations growing up together, side by side. Parents, grandparents, children, with intimate knowledge of one another. Families spread out and planted like treees, connected to the very land itself. Richness of life found through one another. It’s also been a bit shocking to hear many people express, “I don’t like traveling."

I knew when I moved here and still know that this is not me, but for this season – it is me. This is my home now. And this isn’t entirely foreign to me. Though I’ve come to embrace urban “cultured” life, my roots are somewhere in the great plains of Manitoba, in the mixed tongue of low German. My roots are found somewhere in the corn fields and cattle farms and homesteads that have not remained untouched by the modern forces of change. We all scattered as seed; the land sold off and stolen piece by piece.

I trace my line through my mother. As I have grown older, it becomes clearer why. The stories we embrace and tell about ourselves. I grew up in Germany. My mother is Canadian, but not just Canadian: Mennonite. My family emigrated from Holland to Prussia to Russia to Canada. I completely ignore the generations on my father’s side who I have never met or known, who grew up on American soil. As far as I know, my father’s line begins with his mother in the great northwestern state of Oregon, and I’m from the Northwest: somewhere that is far removed from the center of our country, the last territory discovered, on the edge of an ocean which connects us with continents thousands of miles away.

But at the moment, it all seems irrelevant. Now, I’m from Texas.

The Elders

Hope for the world.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/EXERES/59C0C017-4A63-4F97-9D91-D1A336A2B83A.htm

divisadero

Michael Ondaatje has a new novel out, which I discovered by chance through Wikipedia yesterday at work. It must have been orchestrated by the stars because this novel is really brand new (as in The Stranger reviewed it this week). My heart is pounding, and this morning I am craving and savoring the possibility of buying this book and losing myself in it. It's lust in the truest sense: is that wrong? Possibly.

July

I feel restless – alert when I need to be tired and tired when I need to be alert. I am ready to go to bed at 7:30 only to feel wide awake at 10. I wake up at 5:30 clear-headed and by 7:00 AM I’m stumbling through the day. I can hardly drink coffee.

I spent the last two weekends at home and just felt weary but also pleasantly surprised by an ache in my side. Gazing at the great arched backs of gentle warrior mountains, I no longer felt tied to the sweet air and the blistering sun. I felt ready to leave and finally to say: this is not my home and this is not my family. This is something else, once removed.

My family is growing from my limbs, from the soft tissue of my side, from somewhere deep in my heart – I think. Love, now, is thicker than skin. Even if we decided we didn’t want it, it would still choose us. Love is like breath. It slides between our angry gazes and our sharp words and keeps us close.

I like you close. Sometimes you are the only person in the world that I can tolerate. The only person who keeps me sane or keeps me calm. And sometimes you are the one I cannot tolerate, the one who makes me crazy, makes me angry. But that’s ok. I still want you near

christian sex cult

As a former member of the Christian Sex Cult, I highly recommend reading and reflecting on this article: http://www.theotherjournal.com/article.php?id=226.

Leonard Cohen

Leonard Cohen seems like a good soundtrack for today. It is rainy and sad in Seattle, and yet, I'm murmuring still...

If it be your will
if there is a choice
let the rivers fill
let the hills rejoice
Let your mercy spill
On all these burning hearts in hell,
if it be your will
to make us well.

In times like these, all we can do is ask for mercy to draw us close and bind us tight so that we can stand - somehow - in these rags of light.



I recommend Leonard Cohen's Famous Blue Raincoat and, of course, If It Be Your Will - haunting, beautiful, rich.

empty

As we celebrate comings and goings, death finds us in a courageous dance like embers in a subsiding flame suddenly breathed to life. I want to dance. I don’t want to miss this. Yet, there is a sudden sense that the stage is shifting beneath my feet until almost unrecognizable. I never knew this could be so lonely.

In six weeks I will be married. At the moment, though, the more monumental shift seems to be that in six weeks I’ll be moving. Marriage feels natural. Moving feels terrifying – like a violent birthing – and yet it is also exciting as I know that my move into the unknown is preceded and motivated out of love, faith, hope and joy.

Perhaps I am less terrified as I am sad. It hurts to leave what is known, and yet rapidly feels foreign and fading: the people, the places, the tall mountains and dark soil. It will never be the same again, and the call – always – is to keep moving, further up and further in, to travel deeper and wider than I ever thought possible. But how this transience aches. Nothing lasts forever.

Still, I have to get on with the business of life. It is heart wrenching work: surrendering to this ebb and flow.

Why this blog?

Writing is my way of trying to touch that which is impossible to touch, to hold that which is impossible to hold. It is frustrating, ineffable, fragmentary. In the end, it is only a momentary trace, a shadow, a flicker, whose meaning is endlessly translated and transmitted until it is no longer recognizable. Yet, it still somehow seems worth it to me to put life into words, to put my life into words; though, when I return, I find a terrible emptiness. This emptiness is both friend and stranger, and yet it is through fragmentary words that I draw comfort, beauty, grace, clarity, courage – no matter the pain. Wisdom miraculously appearing. And because I know she is not mine to hold, I only want to share her.