Another year older another year wiser

I turned 35 yesterday. I feel wiser, somehow. Here is a list of, in Oprah's words, "What I know for sure."

Stress comes from inside. I used to think that stressful things happened to me. Now I realize it's how I choose to react that causes or prevents stress. This is a daily practice for me. I don't apologize for going my own way, for creating quiet and contemplative space for myself because it's what helps me stay centered.

Love is more about hard work than romance. I used to be one of those girls who thought that my one soul mate was out there somewhere, waiting to be found. I think we have lots of soulmates: friends, sisters, neices, nephews, lovers. Relationships require committment and time to become what you want them to be. Sure, some are more work than others but I have learned to choose my relationships wisely and spend my time working toward worthwhile goals and I think they have payed off.

Dwelling on the negative stuff causes the mind to get bogged down and is anti-productive. I am learning how to express myself and let go of things. It's important to acknowledge the wrongness and ugliness in life, but only if lifes beauty and justness are equally honored. This is a hard one I battle every day. Many of us are raised in a culture, society, and in families that make meaning through negativity. It has become a bad habit, but one that is reversible.

That's it- three little things that have come clear to me in my 35 years on the planet. I feel lucky and blessed to have lived this life and figured a little bit out.

"I's Married Now!"

In the words of Nettie- Celie's sister from The Color Purple. We did it! It was a lovely affair. 95 degrees in the shade. Hot as hot can be. It was a magical day- one of our friends called it "enchanted." It's hard to describe in words. Perhaps pictures will do it justice.

Following Studs Terkel

Last night I dreamt of Studs Terkel
He was living in a junk yard
Abandoned silo-looking warehouses full of stuff
Pieces of ripped fabric and couch cushions had turned yellowish brown by age, wind, and dust
His dog was trailing as he went from warehouse to warehouse
Looking for something he had left behind
All the while I followed
Noticing his hair was half gone, his face pockmarked, tired
Where was my hero, the man who went to places he did not belong
In search of stories no one really wanted to hear?
He must have tired of interviewing poor black folks,
White middle class people with all their guilt
Maybe it drove him crazy, the uselessness of it all
Most would rather not read the words of the oppressed
Let alone write them
Now all this great man did was search the rubble
And I was there following him
Even though I didn’t know what we were looking for.

Happy Juneteenth

What? You didn't realize today was a holiday? Well, it's not officially, except in Texas. I'll be thinking today of how we can celebrate the end of slavery and the beginning of freedom for black people when we have such a long way to go until we are truly free. I'm taking a class called gender and ethnicity that is causing me to look at systems of oppression and the institutionalization of racism, classism, sexism, ableism, etc...

When I was a child, I remember wondering why black folks were still treated so badly when it was white folks that had done us so wrong. It made no sense to me why I had to worry about prejudice when I was clearly the innocent party. Then I grew up to understand that fairness and justness is subjective. That whites were still mentally enslaving whites with their doctrine of (covert) supremacy. It was just more subtle now, almost imperceptible.
Some folks will say that we should move on from the past, that what's done is done and we need to forgive and forget. But there is residue from that past which lives inside us. It is the legacy of slavery that people of color live with the mental side effects of the institution of slavery.

The writer Shelby Steele talks about the development of the "anti-self" in black people that has resulted from years of internalized oppression. This anti-self is "... an interal antagonist and saboteur that embraces the world's negative view of us, that believes our wounds are justified by our own unworthiness, and that entrenches itself as a lifelong voice of doubt." When I think about this concept of the anti-self, it is easy for me to see why so many of our black brothers and sisters end up in jail, on drugs, or both. Why many can't seem to lift ourselves up, but instead break ourselves and each other down. It is hard to be hopeful in the face of such devastating oppression. So, when someone tells me that racism is no longer a problem and they don't see color I just can't believe them. People of color live with the reality of racism every day. We are still fighting to have our voices heard and our experiences believed. We have a long way to go.

Check out more on juneteenth at:
http://www.juneteenth.com/

Letting the light in

A few months ago, we decided to cut down a huge laurel tree between our house and the neighbors. What we didn't know was that there was a blue jay's nest in that tree. As the last few limbs were cut, four featherless baby birds came flying out of the safety of their nest at my face. I ducked and they hit the gravel, squaking for their parents, who were perched nearby watching. To make a long story short, Brad gathered them up with gloved hands, placed them back in the nest, secured the nest to wire mesh, and relocated it to a nearby (leafless) tree. At least a few of them were sighted weeks later attempting to fly. Happy ending, right? Yes, but it is not always so...

The other morning we awoke to chainsaws snarling a few feet from our bedroom window. The neighbor is cutting down the biggest (over 100 feet?) doug fir on the block. We think he wants to build a deck and the tree is too close to his house. The neighbor's missing limbs (they haven't felled the entire tree yet) let more light seep in to the understory of our yard.

A few days after the chainsaws started, a block away, a swath of trees seven acres wide was clearcut in a matter of days. There is a hole in the sky that lets in more sun than we ever thought we'd get in our shady back yard.

This as me wondering what we value more: light or trees? The developers who are going to build tract homes on the now barren wetland probably haven't asked that. I hear we need more homes- Olympia is growing. But I just can't get used to driving by where there was a whole ecosystem and now there's what? Piles of logs and mud. Seems like a shame. But once there were more trees where my house sits.

Last night I dreamt of Grovey- remember the lizard who escaped? Maybe his wildness was in my consciousness, his determination to be uncaged and uninhibited. Perhaps this is what we lose when the trees come down. Then again, it is nice to let the light in.

Weather Report

Spring is here, birds are chirping, the honeysuckle vines attached to the wrought iron on our house are blooming toward the sun, and it is, of course, raining.
Not just raining, but cold- brrrrr....
I heard on the radio we haven't had such low temps in June in 20 years. Wow! I don't hate the rain, though. At least not at this moment. I love how it waters my plants for me, cleanses everything- especially my incredibly dirty car I've been meaning to wash for weeks.
The South African acapella band Ladysmith Black Mambazo sing about rain:

Rain rain rain rain
Beautiful rain
O come, never come
O come, never come
O come to me
Beautiful rain

Granted, they're singing about drought- you always want what you can't have- but I love the idea that rain is beautiful. Those who have read my musings on northwest weather are probable scratching your heads, but I have what you could call a love/hate relationship with the rain.
I love it when I haven't seen it for a while and I'm in that pensive (somber?) mood that rain elicits and when it serves a purpose (doesn't it always?)
I hate it when it sticks around longer than I want. In the beginning of summer, say, when all I want is to feel sun warming my skin.
So, it's spring and I feel like I can't complain about the rain because that's what spring is about right? Showers...

If they haven't stopped by the beginning of July, I might feel differently.

Death don't have no mercy in this land....

I sit in a doctor's office waiting room reading my book on race, class, and gender thinking about how tenuous this thing called life is.
I'm only here to have my throat checked. A five day bout with fatigue and soreness has me wondering if I have strep. This has led me to wonder just how long I'm going to walk this earth. It's a stretch, I know, but I'm prone to overthink things at times... So, I take my tired ass to the clinic because I'm one of the lucky ones who has health care. I sit in wonder at how many "sick" people there are here. I don't know what they're sick with and to be fair, some may be in just for a check-up. But, most, I'm sure, are sick.

An obese woman in a wheelchair scoots past me, her husband not far in tow. He sits behind her. She shouts, "Did I take my 1:00 pill." He (tiredly?) says, "Yes." Wow, that's love.... care. I realize how seldom I am around, let alone interact with people who are disabled, people who face death in their physical (or mental) challenges every day. How different their perspectives must be. Someone recently told me that once you have cancer, every little ache and pain takes on new meaning. they must be asking themselves, is this a sign that the end is near?

Death and dying is just not something we want to talk about. Except in religious terms like heaven and hell, I don't remember the last time I had a discussion with someone about death- and I am part of a circle of people (artists, writers, counselors) who will talk about just about anything. It is the proverbial elephant, no- the wooly mammoth in the room. But, why? Why don't we teach our children about death? What scares us? What keeps us from admitting that it is just a part of life, the other side of the coin?

Back to the hospital room. Minute by minute, my aches and pains don't seem so bad. An old lady hobbles back from the closed door and I wonder what her prognosis is. And why am I here again? Do I want someone to tell me I'm not dying? Aren't we all, really dying? Perhaps, slowly, but dying nonetheless. And why is it morbid (read negatively) to talk about death? Maybe it is the mystery of death we don't like. Maybe it's the not knowing that turns us off. I guess I'm just talking about Americans (or Westerners) here. The Tibetans have a whole book (The Tibetan Book of The Dead) dedicated to death, after all.

My good friend had her best dog friend pass away this year and is dealing with her own perceptions of what that means. As we get older, family members with health problems cause us to ask tought questions with no answers:
What happens to those who pass away?
What would change if we knew the answer to this?

Back at home, I'm still feeling crappy. The doctor tells me I've got the same thing everyone else has this flu season and it will pass. "You're getting older," she tells me. As if I didn't know. Perhaps that's it. Getting older. Getting wiser, maybe, but essentially, weaker. The (negative?) thought that I might get sideswiped while checking the mail suddenly feels oddly inspiring. It seems too cliche to say it makes me want to live every day as if it was my last... But do any of us really know which day it will be?