After staying up too late last night reading Wendell Berry's novel, "Hannah Coulter," in which the protagonist grows up working hard on a farm, going to bed exhausted from manual labor and rising early, I awakened around 7:30, longing for a sleep-in and coffee. Merry was singing a song at my elbow; Elspeth was alternately chewing on my nipple and crawling on my head. I stumbled downstairs and immediately and grumpily began taking stock of my husband's shortcomings. (My husband loves and looks forward to this pasttime of mine). He had not swept the floor or washed the cookie sheet from the night before; he had not fixed me coffee; he had not changed Elspeth's diaper. Never mind that he had cooked dinner the night before and cleaned the kitchen, or that he had fed Elspeth breakfast.
After a good strong cup of coffee, I was able to find my inner reason and begin again my internal discussion of feminism. What does it mean to be a daily feminist? Does it mean ticking off household duties, weighing out who did what and deciding whether I am succumbing to prescribed roles? My brother-in-law has pointed out that the women in my family talk hard feminism but love their men. Well, the two are not exclusive. Gentleness and feminism are not by any means contradictions of each other. And being a feminist does not mean that women are grouchy people or militants, though they jolly well have equal rights to those two things! But the point is, nobody, regardless of who they are, has the right to treat another person badly.
I grew up with the best parents possible. My mother was a feminist in every true meaning of the word; she consistently instilled in her daughters self-respect, determination, and idealism backed by the practice of hard work. She pooh-poohed moodiness, never gave stock to self-pity, and expected us to work hard and hold fast to true ideas of ourselves. Under her guidance, I never doubted for a minute that I was inherently worthwhile and strong. She generally espoused the notion I recently heard in "Mary Poppins," that while men with exceptional character can individually be adored, "as a race they're rather stupid." She did not encourage false vanity and even laughed at it but always, always affirmed that we were beautiful not because of how we appeared, but because of who we were, deep down. Nothing could change that, no matter what people said about us or did to us.
My father is a gentle, soft-spoken, easy-going humble man who works hard, thinks well, succeeds quietly, and loves us all with a deep, abiding tenderness. I have never heard or seen disrespectful behavior from him, especially regarding women. He takes a lot of flack and criticism from my sister and I, but he knows we are proud of him and hold him up as an impossible ideal for all men.
The point is, my parents are more who they are than what they do. My father has his PhD in public health and is a writer; my mother is a powerful speaker and has her Masters of Christian Education, which she took course by course with Kenyan classmates when I was in high school in Nairobi and enjoyed every minute of it. Both my mother and father are self-sacrificial. Both expect and value self-discovery and individual pursuit in each other, and share and nurture newness in each other. Both value family over everything else; both profess to love each other more than they love us, emphasizing that this is the way to love us best. They are not perfect, though I often thought they were. Their marriage is not perfect, though there is far more to admire and emulate in their partnership than to criticize.
My mother is a feminist, and my father is also a feminist. And how could a daughter ask for more?
I wish I could say I fell in love with my husband Martin at first sight. I did not. But I did fall for him at second sight, which is almost as good. After our second meeting, and after just one kooky, wonderful conversation, I told my roommate I had found the man of my dreams. Martin's mind and manner were the first draw; after that I found out he was a musician and a writer. I understood always that he was exceptionally kind in the deepest way. I didn't think much of his poetry at first, but as the years passed I began to think he was an excellent poet. It is handy to be married to a fellow writer, and it is good to be married to a life-long learner and a gentle person. When we married, we discussed children and decided that when we had them, we would both work part-time and stay home part-time. I can say in perfect honesty that Martin would have been happy to stay home full-time while I went out to work.
And then Merry came along. Martin was in graduate school and I was teaching English at the Jesuit high school in Missoula, MT. After my maternity leave, I went back to work, leaving Merry at home with Martin during the day. After work, I came home, Martin passed off baby like a baton and went on to his evening classes. It was miserable. Every time I stepped outside to walk to work, I felt as if I were ripping out my heart and leaving it bleeding in the doorway. Once I was at work, I enjoyed teaching my classes. But I couldn't shake the thought of all I was missing, with Merry changing quickly and still just an infant.
To make the separation harder, Merry refused to take my bottled breastmilk and cried all day, so Martin began rushing her in for feedings during my breaks. I barely saw Martin. We quickly realized this was no way to live.
And then I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I wanted to stop working at the high school and stay home with Merry. I longed for it so much that I categorically insisted that this must be. Martin felt a bit double-crossed, since we had discussed childrearing and agreed that we would share it evenly. "I don't care what I said then," I told him, "This is how I feel now." And so Martin sacrificed for me, and found a full-time job, and I got my heart's desire and stayed with Merry.
This is what the partnership of marriage is about: a life-style of mutuality and self-sacrifice. We have followed Martin's vocation to many different places, and though I take my vocation with me wherever I go (parenting at 'home' and writing), moving in pursuit of his job prospects has involved hard work and sacrifice from me. But it is mutual, and it is based on choice, and that is truly liberating.
I am baffled by women who talk as if they exist purely for the whim of their spouses. "Poor so-and-so," they'll say, referring to their husbands, "I haven't put on lipstick all week." And then, often in the same breath, they berate their spuses and denounce them as demanding and unreasonable devils.
I do not dress, or wear make-up, or do anything purely for Martin's benefit, anymore than he does everything for my benefit. To do so would be unhealthy, because acting in such a way would put unrealistic expectations upon each other. I do not wait around for Martin to fulfill all my needs. He does not depend upon me for his self-worth. If Martin died, God forbid, I would suffer, but I would not stop being a whole person with high expectations of myself and my daughters. And I would jolly well keep putting on clothes to please myself and nobody else.
What Martin says, or does, cannot change the person I am at the core of my being. And vice-versa. At the same time, we expect and celebrate all the things that we mutually contribute to each other and to our family. We realize that we are a small community of sorts, made to exist within a larger community. We realize and affirm that our love for one another must sometimes, and often, involves self-denial.
But true feminism does not come from a series of things I do, or what my profession is (though who a person is and what they do dynamically affects each other). True feminism comes from inside me, from a deep, unchanging well of self-respect and faith that I am whole, worthwhile, and capable. This is an ideal that I wish for everyone I love, male and female. It is a reality that I am constantly reminding myself of and working towards.
Tomorrow, I want to think more about feminism and its practical implications for my daughters.
But now my Elspeth is awake and typing with one hand while I breastfeed with the other is proving tricky. (Note to self: You chose this.) Right-o! So I did! Hallelujah!
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Monday, February 19, 2007
Hot-dogs Don't Tell Tales
At intervals, the sizzling Hebrew National hot-dogs smelled of wet dog and incense. I hoped they were still good. My windows and doors were locked. Nobody would know I was feeding myself, and my daughter Merry, non-organic, unhealthy, bizarre meatstuffs.
Martin and I are semi-vegetarian, semi-organic foodies. We had a brief romance with vegetarianism, during which Martin ate fillet-o-fish at McDonalds and we realized we were part-time carnivores at heart after all. I read enough information on little beef-fed girls who bud breasts and develop cancer to scare me meatless. One of our friends based his doctoral thesis on undercover work in a meat processing plant in the midwest. His stories were enough to make you plant your own bean crop in the back yard. So we compromised. When we are at home, we eat only organic, natural and hormone free, or local meat, and we don't eat that very often (who could afford to?) We feed the girls and lactating me only organic, hormone-free milk.
And generally speaking, I publicly denounce hot-dogs.
But I have a secret passion for Hebrew-National, so much so that this year during the superbowl at my parents house, when my mother sent away an unopened package of Hebrew National Franks with my brother and his girlfriend, I disgraced myself by throwing a mini temper tantrum.
--Those were SPECIAL, I hissed, as my brother's girlfriend disappeared to put on her coat. --Those were SPECIAL TREATS.
My mother shrugged as if to remind me that my little brother lives in an almost-condemned house, works hard, and most importantly, is my blood relation, after all.
--We still have the other package, she said, referring to the sorry buy-one-get-one-free, preservative-packed, non-kosher mystery dogs in our refrigerator.
--He doesn't even CARE about his health, I complained, holding an invisible cigarette in my fingers. Besides smoking, my brother does horrible things like eating frozen Jimmy Dean sausage sandwiches.
--I saved one of the Hebrew National for Merry, my mother pointed out, just before my brother and his girlfriend reappeared. I banished my pout until they were safely in the cold air, plastic sack in hand--containing not only the whole package of expensive kosher hot-dogs but the rest of the salt and vinegar kettle-cooked chips! Double-whammy.
When I came back home from my parents house with the girls, Martin had a surprise in store for me. Nestled in our rickety, twenty-year old refrigerator drawer, not one, but two Hebrew National hot-dog packages smiled up at me. I have shared this secret with nobody. When our friends came for lunch and Merry mentioned the possibility of hot-dogs, their mother, a vegan, pooh-poohed.
--Oh, no, she said. --I don't think your mother would have hot dogs.
I did not admit my secret and shameful cache but instead shoveled Trader Joe's macaroni and cheese onto her children's plates. I saved the Hebrew National for quiet afternoons, like lunchtime today. It did not matter to me that they smelled odd as they cooked.
As we waited for them to pockmark deliciously in the pan, Merry read me the book she had created this morning out of green construction paper, called "The Cornia Tales."
--This is a tale about Merry, the artist, Cocoa the famous doctor, and Elephant, the farmer,
she began.
She went on, undeterred by Elspeth, who was making a sound like a blocked vacuum cleaner with every bite of natural, dye-free noodles.
--Sometimes Elephant did bad things, but Merry forgave him anyway, Merry continued, holding up the picture for me to see. And then the book abruptly ended. The hot-dogs were blackened and smelled delicious. I slid one onto her plate.
--I don't think that book has enough narrative tension, I pointed out.
Merry picked up her hot-dog and licked it.--Yes it does, she argued.--It has narrative tension because sometimes Elephant does bad things. Also, it's only the first book.
--Good, I said, and bit into my lovely, hot, tasty, clandestine Hebrew National hot-dog. I finished it quickly and with gusto. Within minutes of the last bite, I doubled over with a stomach cramp.
Merry looked up from her hot-dog, which she was nibbling slowly and deliberately. "Maybe you'll throw up it," she said.
And here's the real source of narrative tension: the things we claim publicly and proudly; the things we actually do in secret; and the consequences when the first two do not meet. Call it the ego and the id, if you will. I call it a stomach cramp. But guess what? The cramp passed, and I squirreled the rest of the Hebrew National hot-dogs safely away in our cheese drawer. They wait there for another quiet afternoon. And they aren't telling any tales.
Martin and I are semi-vegetarian, semi-organic foodies. We had a brief romance with vegetarianism, during which Martin ate fillet-o-fish at McDonalds and we realized we were part-time carnivores at heart after all. I read enough information on little beef-fed girls who bud breasts and develop cancer to scare me meatless. One of our friends based his doctoral thesis on undercover work in a meat processing plant in the midwest. His stories were enough to make you plant your own bean crop in the back yard. So we compromised. When we are at home, we eat only organic, natural and hormone free, or local meat, and we don't eat that very often (who could afford to?) We feed the girls and lactating me only organic, hormone-free milk.
And generally speaking, I publicly denounce hot-dogs.
But I have a secret passion for Hebrew-National, so much so that this year during the superbowl at my parents house, when my mother sent away an unopened package of Hebrew National Franks with my brother and his girlfriend, I disgraced myself by throwing a mini temper tantrum.
--Those were SPECIAL, I hissed, as my brother's girlfriend disappeared to put on her coat. --Those were SPECIAL TREATS.
My mother shrugged as if to remind me that my little brother lives in an almost-condemned house, works hard, and most importantly, is my blood relation, after all.
--We still have the other package, she said, referring to the sorry buy-one-get-one-free, preservative-packed, non-kosher mystery dogs in our refrigerator.
--He doesn't even CARE about his health, I complained, holding an invisible cigarette in my fingers. Besides smoking, my brother does horrible things like eating frozen Jimmy Dean sausage sandwiches.
--I saved one of the Hebrew National for Merry, my mother pointed out, just before my brother and his girlfriend reappeared. I banished my pout until they were safely in the cold air, plastic sack in hand--containing not only the whole package of expensive kosher hot-dogs but the rest of the salt and vinegar kettle-cooked chips! Double-whammy.
When I came back home from my parents house with the girls, Martin had a surprise in store for me. Nestled in our rickety, twenty-year old refrigerator drawer, not one, but two Hebrew National hot-dog packages smiled up at me. I have shared this secret with nobody. When our friends came for lunch and Merry mentioned the possibility of hot-dogs, their mother, a vegan, pooh-poohed.
--Oh, no, she said. --I don't think your mother would have hot dogs.
I did not admit my secret and shameful cache but instead shoveled Trader Joe's macaroni and cheese onto her children's plates. I saved the Hebrew National for quiet afternoons, like lunchtime today. It did not matter to me that they smelled odd as they cooked.
As we waited for them to pockmark deliciously in the pan, Merry read me the book she had created this morning out of green construction paper, called "The Cornia Tales."
--This is a tale about Merry, the artist, Cocoa the famous doctor, and Elephant, the farmer,
she began.
She went on, undeterred by Elspeth, who was making a sound like a blocked vacuum cleaner with every bite of natural, dye-free noodles.
--Sometimes Elephant did bad things, but Merry forgave him anyway, Merry continued, holding up the picture for me to see. And then the book abruptly ended. The hot-dogs were blackened and smelled delicious. I slid one onto her plate.
--I don't think that book has enough narrative tension, I pointed out.
Merry picked up her hot-dog and licked it.--Yes it does, she argued.--It has narrative tension because sometimes Elephant does bad things. Also, it's only the first book.
--Good, I said, and bit into my lovely, hot, tasty, clandestine Hebrew National hot-dog. I finished it quickly and with gusto. Within minutes of the last bite, I doubled over with a stomach cramp.
Merry looked up from her hot-dog, which she was nibbling slowly and deliberately. "Maybe you'll throw up it," she said.
And here's the real source of narrative tension: the things we claim publicly and proudly; the things we actually do in secret; and the consequences when the first two do not meet. Call it the ego and the id, if you will. I call it a stomach cramp. But guess what? The cramp passed, and I squirreled the rest of the Hebrew National hot-dogs safely away in our cheese drawer. They wait there for another quiet afternoon. And they aren't telling any tales.
Sunday, February 18, 2007
A Nut Searches for Her Inner Light
Today, sitting in the balcony at a church in town, I noticed that the chandeliers looked like heavily pregnant spiders. The pastor's wife asked me how I was and I said, "Oh, this winter! I feel like a nut, in a shell, and I'm knocking for spring." I noticed Martin looking at me askance.
Maybe it is the snow, and the long winter, that makes me restless. I wandered from the sermon to the window and beyond, where the snow was blowing. Looking sideways, I felt like my daughter Merry must when I take her face between my hands and say, "Look at my eyes when I talk to you!" Merry's eyes dart and then fixate on something fascinating on her right.
I don't think that God had my face crammed into his hands and was willing me to look forward at the pastor. I think perhaps I was gazing sideways away from my own guilt and out to God in the swirling snow.
The service ended with a hymn I disliked so strongly that I refused to sing part of it. There was war imagery, which of course is "Biblical" (along with a whole host of things you don't want your children knowing about) and Western, and also filled with requests for God to shake us from calmness and contentment. If anything, I thought, we need to stop fighting, release ourselves, and find contentment. And that does not come from striving and squinting and begging. It comes from letting our hands fall open, and it comes from being silent.
Quaker meeting, anyone?
Martin would love to celebrate the Inner Light and join a Quaker meeting. We actually visited a Quaker meeting in the next big town over. It was good to be silent for an hour, and I wondered what profound thoughts everyone was thinking during the calm. When the optional sharing time came at the end, I was disappointed. One lady said she liked gardening. (And why would this have disappointed me? I love gardening, too, and feels it draws me closer to what is real and true.) Another man recounted a rather bizarre dream about his mother and roses, and now that I write this I can't think of exactly why that was disappointing, either.
Episcopalian service, anyone?
Perhaps I am still an Episcopal at heart, and want the structure, meaning and otherness of the liturgy. The liturgy says all my insides long to utter but cannot articulate.
I am one of many of my generation who grew up in churches, still love God, but do not love churches. We want to serve Jesus but wonder if Jesus would darken a church door if he were around now. But we join the many who go anyway, because there are few acceptable alternatives, especially when you have children--and especially when you feel guilty and disenfranchised if you don't go. But as the pastor talked about hypocrisy this morning, I suddenly woke up and thought, Ah! That's me. Here I am sitting in church.
Of course it's complicated.
Bruderhof community, anyone?
Anyone up for a house church? By this I mean everyone eats brunch at a long table, and a person reads from the prayer book, and we sing a few hymns. But we eat lots of pancakes and share grace by soaping dishes together.
Catholic conversion, anyone?
Martin and I briefly considered becoming Catholic. We became envious of the Catholics sitting around us in mass, who had never considered being anything else. For people like us (evangelical kids-turned -Episcopalian) to become Catholic, we have to become Catholic hook, line and sinker. We have to wrestle with every doctrine and sweat over whether we can truly convert or not. And then when our parents (who are worried about their children converting) visit, they can't take Eucharist, and by then we've stopped birth control and are having babies up the wazoo. If you are born as a Catholic, count your blessings. You can stay Catholic and use birth control and disagree with the Pope. But if you are not a cradle-Catholic and you decide to convert, you have to sign on the dotted line under every doctrine. At least that's how we felt. And we couldn't do it.
So now we're easy-going but fraught-with-questions/ evangelical turned Episcopalian/Catholic-Mennonite-Bruderhof-Quaker wannabees/ attendees at a Presbyterian Church. While we would have liked to have tea with Calvin, we would have kept the conversation on the snow and the spider-like light fixtures and away from predestination and perseverance of the saints.
Nevertheless, Martin and I are going to sing in the choir. Go figure. Life is a series of tensions.
So, I'll close with a song from Merry, who has no doctrinal issues. (During this song, Elspeth, who is the more pragmatic of the two girls, grunted along audibly in a concerted and stinky effort, but this did not dim Merry's Inner Light as she sang):
Jesus is a-somewhere.
Where? I don't know!
In the clouds?
He's not here; I don't see him
But every day he's here with us
Even though you can't see him,
When you go to bed he's there.
The angels will be here,
Even the angels.
If you look up into the sky at night
You'll see 1,000 stars.
Jesus is made up of stars.
I love Jesus my light!
Jesus is my star and the sun.
Oh, that Merry girl would make a great Quaker.
Maybe it is the snow, and the long winter, that makes me restless. I wandered from the sermon to the window and beyond, where the snow was blowing. Looking sideways, I felt like my daughter Merry must when I take her face between my hands and say, "Look at my eyes when I talk to you!" Merry's eyes dart and then fixate on something fascinating on her right.
I don't think that God had my face crammed into his hands and was willing me to look forward at the pastor. I think perhaps I was gazing sideways away from my own guilt and out to God in the swirling snow.
The service ended with a hymn I disliked so strongly that I refused to sing part of it. There was war imagery, which of course is "Biblical" (along with a whole host of things you don't want your children knowing about) and Western, and also filled with requests for God to shake us from calmness and contentment. If anything, I thought, we need to stop fighting, release ourselves, and find contentment. And that does not come from striving and squinting and begging. It comes from letting our hands fall open, and it comes from being silent.
Quaker meeting, anyone?
Martin would love to celebrate the Inner Light and join a Quaker meeting. We actually visited a Quaker meeting in the next big town over. It was good to be silent for an hour, and I wondered what profound thoughts everyone was thinking during the calm. When the optional sharing time came at the end, I was disappointed. One lady said she liked gardening. (And why would this have disappointed me? I love gardening, too, and feels it draws me closer to what is real and true.) Another man recounted a rather bizarre dream about his mother and roses, and now that I write this I can't think of exactly why that was disappointing, either.
Episcopalian service, anyone?
Perhaps I am still an Episcopal at heart, and want the structure, meaning and otherness of the liturgy. The liturgy says all my insides long to utter but cannot articulate.
I am one of many of my generation who grew up in churches, still love God, but do not love churches. We want to serve Jesus but wonder if Jesus would darken a church door if he were around now. But we join the many who go anyway, because there are few acceptable alternatives, especially when you have children--and especially when you feel guilty and disenfranchised if you don't go. But as the pastor talked about hypocrisy this morning, I suddenly woke up and thought, Ah! That's me. Here I am sitting in church.
Of course it's complicated.
Bruderhof community, anyone?
Anyone up for a house church? By this I mean everyone eats brunch at a long table, and a person reads from the prayer book, and we sing a few hymns. But we eat lots of pancakes and share grace by soaping dishes together.
Catholic conversion, anyone?
Martin and I briefly considered becoming Catholic. We became envious of the Catholics sitting around us in mass, who had never considered being anything else. For people like us (evangelical kids-turned -Episcopalian) to become Catholic, we have to become Catholic hook, line and sinker. We have to wrestle with every doctrine and sweat over whether we can truly convert or not. And then when our parents (who are worried about their children converting) visit, they can't take Eucharist, and by then we've stopped birth control and are having babies up the wazoo. If you are born as a Catholic, count your blessings. You can stay Catholic and use birth control and disagree with the Pope. But if you are not a cradle-Catholic and you decide to convert, you have to sign on the dotted line under every doctrine. At least that's how we felt. And we couldn't do it.
So now we're easy-going but fraught-with-questions/ evangelical turned Episcopalian/Catholic-Mennonite-Bruderhof-Quaker wannabees/ attendees at a Presbyterian Church. While we would have liked to have tea with Calvin, we would have kept the conversation on the snow and the spider-like light fixtures and away from predestination and perseverance of the saints.
Nevertheless, Martin and I are going to sing in the choir. Go figure. Life is a series of tensions.
So, I'll close with a song from Merry, who has no doctrinal issues. (During this song, Elspeth, who is the more pragmatic of the two girls, grunted along audibly in a concerted and stinky effort, but this did not dim Merry's Inner Light as she sang):
Jesus is a-somewhere.
Where? I don't know!
In the clouds?
He's not here; I don't see him
But every day he's here with us
Even though you can't see him,
When you go to bed he's there.
The angels will be here,
Even the angels.
If you look up into the sky at night
You'll see 1,000 stars.
Jesus is made up of stars.
I love Jesus my light!
Jesus is my star and the sun.
Oh, that Merry girl would make a great Quaker.
Saturday, February 17, 2007
For This Morning, at 3:30 a.m.
In a place close to us this morning, six children burned to death. They would have been deeply asleep when the fire started, tucked away inside their beds as the world froze around them. Just as my children were at 3:30 this morning.
God is not trustworthy in the way I want him to be. I want to tell children, don't worry; you will be safe. God will keep you safe. I want to tell my children this; I want a guarantee that they will live long, joyful lives. I want to promise them that they will live to see their own children sleeping well and safely in beds.
My one-year old's mouth cups my breast and pulls milk from my body. As long as she wants to eat, I will hold her there, feeling the soft warmth of her downy hair against the inside of my arm.
My five year old sleeps, arms splayed open above her head, cheeks pink, mouth open. I bend close to hear her breathing.
There were three skeletons archaeologists uncovered in the ruins of Pompeii. I saw the picture in National Geographic: A man's arm covered his wife's shoulder; his knee nestled gently into her back. She in turn was curved around the bones of a baby. I hear the breath of that family, the sighs of their dreaming, suspended like glowing suns above their bed. I hear the hush of their sleep, the music of their contentment. Then, in an instant, it disappears like the smoke of a candle.
I finger my one year old's toes, one by one, hold the heel of her foot in the palm of my hand. I hear the laughter of my daughters, glittering like sun-caught dust in the windows of my house.
In Dresden, in Hiroshima, in so many places at so many times, children were eating. They were singing songs like my daughters. They were holding pencils and drawing; bent over books, tasting new words; rolling bright green balls across their floors. Their breaths were like bright birds, flying in circles, showing the undersides of brilliant, beating wings.
O, God. My Father and Mother God, you do not offer me the promises I want so much. And I, in turn, cannot give them to my children.
God is not trustworthy in the way I want him to be. I want to tell children, don't worry; you will be safe. God will keep you safe. I want to tell my children this; I want a guarantee that they will live long, joyful lives. I want to promise them that they will live to see their own children sleeping well and safely in beds.
My one-year old's mouth cups my breast and pulls milk from my body. As long as she wants to eat, I will hold her there, feeling the soft warmth of her downy hair against the inside of my arm.
My five year old sleeps, arms splayed open above her head, cheeks pink, mouth open. I bend close to hear her breathing.
There were three skeletons archaeologists uncovered in the ruins of Pompeii. I saw the picture in National Geographic: A man's arm covered his wife's shoulder; his knee nestled gently into her back. She in turn was curved around the bones of a baby. I hear the breath of that family, the sighs of their dreaming, suspended like glowing suns above their bed. I hear the hush of their sleep, the music of their contentment. Then, in an instant, it disappears like the smoke of a candle.
I finger my one year old's toes, one by one, hold the heel of her foot in the palm of my hand. I hear the laughter of my daughters, glittering like sun-caught dust in the windows of my house.
In Dresden, in Hiroshima, in so many places at so many times, children were eating. They were singing songs like my daughters. They were holding pencils and drawing; bent over books, tasting new words; rolling bright green balls across their floors. Their breaths were like bright birds, flying in circles, showing the undersides of brilliant, beating wings.
O, God. My Father and Mother God, you do not offer me the promises I want so much. And I, in turn, cannot give them to my children.
Friday, February 16, 2007
No Substitute for a Barn Raising
My husband-professor Martin gave me my first taste of "Facebook" last night. The sheer amount of information, split-ends of messages, and dribbling trails of self-examination were mind-boggling to me. He had posted a picture of me with a swollen face.
--What's the matter with my face? I asked. It looks as if I've been stung by dozens of bees.
--Oh, you were pregnant then, he said.
But of course it was a picture JUST of my face and shoulders.
lol. What's that? I asked. Laugh out loud, of course. I must be the only one on the PLANET who doesn't know lol.
--And these are the "friends," Martin said, indicating a scroll of names and pictures with the mouse. "They're not friends, actually, in the way of real friends, all of them," he said, and helped me understand a person can have two hundred or two thousand "friends," depending on who decides to let you be their companion, in that way. Not companion, but friend. A different sort of friend.
--Really, I said, in a cynical way. You mean they're not really friends?
* * * * * * *
I grew up in Kenya on a housing compound surrounded by a white gate, dense thorn hedges, and high walls trailing with morning glories. (But this was true for every house and compound in Nairobi). In my compound, I lived in one of perhaps twelve maisonettes, or townhouses, with the members of my immediate family. Across the way lived two Israeli families; down to our right we could smell the then-Zairian (now Congolese) family's fish drying on their lawn; also, there were a few Brits, a couple East Indians, and one handsome, naughty Spaniard. My little brother was in love with the Mexican American girl next door. My mother's Somalian friend came over once and while to drink tea and tell my mother about the idiots at the drygoods store and how she had dismantled their shelves in protest. Her house always smelled of incense and occasionally she wore sheer, expensive outfits and had bellydances with her friends. My sister and I put on a Christmas play in front of the hibiscus bushes with the Nigerian kids.
Always our door was opening and closing; always there were the thuds of bare feet on our wooden floors; always there were shafts of sunlight and tea in the back garden. Our house was constantly bustling with our community in the compound and the endless international guests my mother and father entertained. I learned as a child to sit at the dinner table and absorb the conversations of doctors and film directors and mothers and fathers. Our lives were full, so full that one year there was perhaps only a week when we didn't have company in the house. I loved it and hated it; I was drawn into the fray and frazzled by the fray. There was a small space between the refrigerator and the kitchen wall where I folded myself into when the company got too thick.
Even the driving in Kenya felt relational. It had to be because none of my friends or I had driver's licenses; none of us had e-mail, of course, or our own computers, or any TV schedule to keep up with, though The Cosby Show did come on once and a while. We spent long evenings playing outside, making up plays indoors or laughing, and reading and playing games.
Our compound in Kenya, diverse and exciting, is what many people's online community is now. You can e-mail or chat with a person in India or Uganda or England, and you can do it in your skivvies from the warm upstairs room of Wazoo Farm in PA.
But it's not the same. Something feels amiss.
* * * * * * * * * * *
For about six months, our family did without the internet at home. When I first cancelled our DSL, I had illusions about writing sheaves of letters. I could taste the envelope adhesive on my tongue. I would finally get rid of those stacks of stationary and cards.
Not having internet at home was inconvenient; I take care of the bills and finances and much of that business is taken care of online. But it was also wonderful. Martin, who quickly gets sucked into baseball stats and bottomless wells of trivia and "news," jolly well had to talk to me instead. We read more, played more music, talked face-to-face instead of side-by-side, with the blue shadow of a computer screen flickering on our faces. If we had an urgent question, like WHO was in that movie, we had to wait for the answer.
I fell down on e-mail, and since I hate telephones, and it has been winter forever, I became somewhat of a recluse.
In the silences that no e-mail left, our house echoed. This is our second year here, and the community that seemed to happen so seamlessly in other places we've lived has been slow here. We know one other family well, and they are odd-balls like us. Without their friendship, we should be all at sea, I'm afraid. Part of this is our fault; we've become busy with so many things we can't really name, and Martin stays very busy at work. Compared to most American families we probably have more company than most.
But people seem to keep to themselves, occupied with what Merry likes to sing: TOO MUCH OF NOTHING. I can't help but think that the Internet, and cellphones, and Facebook, has much to do with that. Have we filled ourselves so full of that alternative community that we don't need human flesh anymore?
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
Last night I noticed my eyes were bloodshot.
The night before, Merry came up to bed, Rose book in hand, and said, Mommy, don't do what you did last night. --That is, I had sat at the computer, hammering away, as Merry sat in bed waiting for me to read to her.
Confession. Hear me, for I am hooked. It's been less than a week since we restarted the Internet.
Here's another funny thing. When I'm around TV, I realize that TV is insulting. There are few shows that are worth watching; the news is full of NOTHING; the advertisements are condescending and damaging to my children; the reality TV offers more of NOTHING. But all these things, like junk food, fill you up until you forget that you're hungry anymore.
Too much of nothing can make a man feel ill at ease.
It's all been done before; it's all been written in a book.
When there's too much of nothing. . .
I am outraged by the fact that the media assumes that I am dying to know about celebrities' lives. I don't give a damn about their personal details, or their clothes, or their petty arguments, any more than I should care about Jane Smith over in Iowa who burned her meatloaf last night. I find it utterly depressing that people I love seem to know a whole list of dull details about so-and-so, and even worse, want to talk about them. Knowing more NOTHING makes people feel important.
I found this out when I returned from Kenya straight into college. I stood out the fringes of crowds who batted around pop trivia like a volleyball, back and forth, quickly, happily, smiling at each other and at their own cleverness. Then the pop trivia volleyball whizzed toward me; I stuttered, "I actually haven't ever watched that show--I don't know who she is--" and the volleyball fell through my open, hopeless fingers. I couldn't play social volleyball any more than I can play real volleyball, because I hadn't studied up on the rules.
Confession. In the evening, when darkness is falling and the lamps I switch on do not seem to banish the shadows--in the evening, when I am tired and weary of talking to my children and angry that Martin is late--in the evening, I sometimes long for the noise of the TV. And I don't want a DvD. I want the same TV everyone, everywhere across my town, is watching. I crave the sense of connectedness.
* * * * * * * * * *
But this dichotomy, this separation of body and soul, is not new. In a way, we are the New Platonists. We are nothing more than so many spirits, sending messages through the black expanses of space, listening to voices in our ears that have no warmth.
My house echoes so often, and it cannot be filled by the community of handless images on Facebook. My insides sometimes echo, too, and while an e-mail fills the emptiness for a minute, it does not fill me like a handshake, or a hug, or the comfort of sitting down with my friend face-to-face. The Internet and chatrooms do not call on me to serve, to brew tea, to cook a meal, and so they cannot possibly ever become a substitute for real friendship.
There are no real barn-raisings online. There is no bad breath, no BO, no particular sound of a friend's voice accompanied by their breath, by the warmth of their fingers, by the sounds of their footfalls.
The Amish must be right. Technology distracts us from real community.
Yet here I am, in my pajamas at 11 in the morning, typing away. And I feel, as I so often do, filled with longing for the sounds of diverse voices in my house. I want the rooms filled. I want help with the farm that does not exist yet. I welcome the messes that real people, with real bodies, bring.
--What's the matter with my face? I asked. It looks as if I've been stung by dozens of bees.
--Oh, you were pregnant then, he said.
But of course it was a picture JUST of my face and shoulders.
lol. What's that? I asked. Laugh out loud, of course. I must be the only one on the PLANET who doesn't know lol.
--And these are the "friends," Martin said, indicating a scroll of names and pictures with the mouse. "They're not friends, actually, in the way of real friends, all of them," he said, and helped me understand a person can have two hundred or two thousand "friends," depending on who decides to let you be their companion, in that way. Not companion, but friend. A different sort of friend.
--Really, I said, in a cynical way. You mean they're not really friends?
* * * * * * *
I grew up in Kenya on a housing compound surrounded by a white gate, dense thorn hedges, and high walls trailing with morning glories. (But this was true for every house and compound in Nairobi). In my compound, I lived in one of perhaps twelve maisonettes, or townhouses, with the members of my immediate family. Across the way lived two Israeli families; down to our right we could smell the then-Zairian (now Congolese) family's fish drying on their lawn; also, there were a few Brits, a couple East Indians, and one handsome, naughty Spaniard. My little brother was in love with the Mexican American girl next door. My mother's Somalian friend came over once and while to drink tea and tell my mother about the idiots at the drygoods store and how she had dismantled their shelves in protest. Her house always smelled of incense and occasionally she wore sheer, expensive outfits and had bellydances with her friends. My sister and I put on a Christmas play in front of the hibiscus bushes with the Nigerian kids.
Always our door was opening and closing; always there were the thuds of bare feet on our wooden floors; always there were shafts of sunlight and tea in the back garden. Our house was constantly bustling with our community in the compound and the endless international guests my mother and father entertained. I learned as a child to sit at the dinner table and absorb the conversations of doctors and film directors and mothers and fathers. Our lives were full, so full that one year there was perhaps only a week when we didn't have company in the house. I loved it and hated it; I was drawn into the fray and frazzled by the fray. There was a small space between the refrigerator and the kitchen wall where I folded myself into when the company got too thick.
Even the driving in Kenya felt relational. It had to be because none of my friends or I had driver's licenses; none of us had e-mail, of course, or our own computers, or any TV schedule to keep up with, though The Cosby Show did come on once and a while. We spent long evenings playing outside, making up plays indoors or laughing, and reading and playing games.
Our compound in Kenya, diverse and exciting, is what many people's online community is now. You can e-mail or chat with a person in India or Uganda or England, and you can do it in your skivvies from the warm upstairs room of Wazoo Farm in PA.
But it's not the same. Something feels amiss.
* * * * * * * * * * *
For about six months, our family did without the internet at home. When I first cancelled our DSL, I had illusions about writing sheaves of letters. I could taste the envelope adhesive on my tongue. I would finally get rid of those stacks of stationary and cards.
Not having internet at home was inconvenient; I take care of the bills and finances and much of that business is taken care of online. But it was also wonderful. Martin, who quickly gets sucked into baseball stats and bottomless wells of trivia and "news," jolly well had to talk to me instead. We read more, played more music, talked face-to-face instead of side-by-side, with the blue shadow of a computer screen flickering on our faces. If we had an urgent question, like WHO was in that movie, we had to wait for the answer.
I fell down on e-mail, and since I hate telephones, and it has been winter forever, I became somewhat of a recluse.
In the silences that no e-mail left, our house echoed. This is our second year here, and the community that seemed to happen so seamlessly in other places we've lived has been slow here. We know one other family well, and they are odd-balls like us. Without their friendship, we should be all at sea, I'm afraid. Part of this is our fault; we've become busy with so many things we can't really name, and Martin stays very busy at work. Compared to most American families we probably have more company than most.
But people seem to keep to themselves, occupied with what Merry likes to sing: TOO MUCH OF NOTHING. I can't help but think that the Internet, and cellphones, and Facebook, has much to do with that. Have we filled ourselves so full of that alternative community that we don't need human flesh anymore?
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
Last night I noticed my eyes were bloodshot.
The night before, Merry came up to bed, Rose book in hand, and said, Mommy, don't do what you did last night. --That is, I had sat at the computer, hammering away, as Merry sat in bed waiting for me to read to her.
Confession. Hear me, for I am hooked. It's been less than a week since we restarted the Internet.
Here's another funny thing. When I'm around TV, I realize that TV is insulting. There are few shows that are worth watching; the news is full of NOTHING; the advertisements are condescending and damaging to my children; the reality TV offers more of NOTHING. But all these things, like junk food, fill you up until you forget that you're hungry anymore.
Too much of nothing can make a man feel ill at ease.
It's all been done before; it's all been written in a book.
When there's too much of nothing. . .
I am outraged by the fact that the media assumes that I am dying to know about celebrities' lives. I don't give a damn about their personal details, or their clothes, or their petty arguments, any more than I should care about Jane Smith over in Iowa who burned her meatloaf last night. I find it utterly depressing that people I love seem to know a whole list of dull details about so-and-so, and even worse, want to talk about them. Knowing more NOTHING makes people feel important.
I found this out when I returned from Kenya straight into college. I stood out the fringes of crowds who batted around pop trivia like a volleyball, back and forth, quickly, happily, smiling at each other and at their own cleverness. Then the pop trivia volleyball whizzed toward me; I stuttered, "I actually haven't ever watched that show--I don't know who she is--" and the volleyball fell through my open, hopeless fingers. I couldn't play social volleyball any more than I can play real volleyball, because I hadn't studied up on the rules.
Confession. In the evening, when darkness is falling and the lamps I switch on do not seem to banish the shadows--in the evening, when I am tired and weary of talking to my children and angry that Martin is late--in the evening, I sometimes long for the noise of the TV. And I don't want a DvD. I want the same TV everyone, everywhere across my town, is watching. I crave the sense of connectedness.
* * * * * * * * * *
But this dichotomy, this separation of body and soul, is not new. In a way, we are the New Platonists. We are nothing more than so many spirits, sending messages through the black expanses of space, listening to voices in our ears that have no warmth.
My house echoes so often, and it cannot be filled by the community of handless images on Facebook. My insides sometimes echo, too, and while an e-mail fills the emptiness for a minute, it does not fill me like a handshake, or a hug, or the comfort of sitting down with my friend face-to-face. The Internet and chatrooms do not call on me to serve, to brew tea, to cook a meal, and so they cannot possibly ever become a substitute for real friendship.
There are no real barn-raisings online. There is no bad breath, no BO, no particular sound of a friend's voice accompanied by their breath, by the warmth of their fingers, by the sounds of their footfalls.
The Amish must be right. Technology distracts us from real community.
Yet here I am, in my pajamas at 11 in the morning, typing away. And I feel, as I so often do, filled with longing for the sounds of diverse voices in my house. I want the rooms filled. I want help with the farm that does not exist yet. I welcome the messes that real people, with real bodies, bring.
Thursday, February 15, 2007
Dead Mice, Feminism, and Why I as a Feminist am Not Good All the Time
Merry thrusts her arms into the air, like a mad swimmer. She is conducting her invisible orchestra. Peanut butter and jam smear her cheeks. I don't care if I'm not good! she sings to the increasingly vigorous baroque music burbling from the radio. I don't care if you're not good! She plunges a finger into her sandwich, leaving a hole.
This is lunch time, after which I open the doors to retrieve a plastic-wrapped square of dish detergent (the same that Elspeth took a bite from and then vomited into the sink two weeks ago). I slam the doors shut, put a hand to my mouth, admit into the air a high-pitched sound that is generally reserved for passionate and rodent encounters both. AHHH.
--What is it, Mommy?
--Nothing, I say, as I shove the handles of several wooden spoons through the cabinet handles.
--Yes, I saw you put your hand up to your mouth.
I try to banish the glimpse of the mouse, in a pool of coagulating blood, snapped by the trap.
It's not that I didn't want to catch the little rodent.
We've been trying for weeks. At the beginning we felt sorry for the mice but were optimistic about a catch. My husband, Martin and I tried for the last part of an evening hunched over the little traps, bending back the springs and almost losing fingertips. Finally Martin pronounced his triumph and superiority with dohickies by getting the trap to stay sprung. He set it gingerly in our kitchen cabinet, and we arose the next morning with apprehension. Martin's bravado from the night before had sadly diminished in the face of mouse murder--classic morning after--and so I threw open the cabinet doors myself, expecting to see carnage. Instead, the mouse had escaped with the peanut butter, which is no small feat considering its adhesive properties, but left the trap intact. Martin, who is a pacifist to the core, seemed secretly pleased.
As the mice outsmarted us night after night, his pride in them grew.
You're really happy they're getting away, I told him.
No---he said with an odd light in his eyes--But it is really a smart mouse.
I asked him if he had prayed that the mouse would escape. And he said, kind of.
I reminded him of disease, and that we have a child who eats everything, including indistinguishable things, in greedy fistfuls from the ground. I went back for more traps. There was a prominent display of traps at the front of the store, including a huge rat trap that made me shudder. As I paid, I told the men at the hardware store: I used to feel sorry for the mice, but I don't any more.
They laughed.
--Yes, I said, I can hardly wait to see their little necks broken.
They stopped laughing. This cessation of merriment, I know, was prompted by the realization that I was not so much funny as frightening. I had crossed the line from being femininely charming to being a feminist. Or a mad woman. Both of these things--feminist and mad women--I am into. But I do not think the hardware chappies were.
In any case, I talk a bigger game than I play. One glimpse of that gory mouse and understood two things:
1. the source of the odd smell I had detected off and on all morning
2. the fact that I would, in the near future, call Martin and tell him that I would rather
a. clean up human vomit
b. move away
c. scream my guts out
than deal with the dead mouse.
"Of course you would rather clean up vomit," he said, when I told him. "So would I. So would anyone."
Don't get me wrong. I am a feminist, and I am a tough woman. I have endured Elspeth falling down a flight of stairs with an open pair of scissors; roto viruses; boils as a child. But dead animals somehow just put me over the living edge.
We all have our weaknesses, and like Merry, I don't care if I'm not good. I will shovel the snow tonight, and Martin can jolly well take care of the mouse.
This is lunch time, after which I open the doors to retrieve a plastic-wrapped square of dish detergent (the same that Elspeth took a bite from and then vomited into the sink two weeks ago). I slam the doors shut, put a hand to my mouth, admit into the air a high-pitched sound that is generally reserved for passionate and rodent encounters both. AHHH.
--What is it, Mommy?
--Nothing, I say, as I shove the handles of several wooden spoons through the cabinet handles.
--Yes, I saw you put your hand up to your mouth.
I try to banish the glimpse of the mouse, in a pool of coagulating blood, snapped by the trap.
It's not that I didn't want to catch the little rodent.
We've been trying for weeks. At the beginning we felt sorry for the mice but were optimistic about a catch. My husband, Martin and I tried for the last part of an evening hunched over the little traps, bending back the springs and almost losing fingertips. Finally Martin pronounced his triumph and superiority with dohickies by getting the trap to stay sprung. He set it gingerly in our kitchen cabinet, and we arose the next morning with apprehension. Martin's bravado from the night before had sadly diminished in the face of mouse murder--classic morning after--and so I threw open the cabinet doors myself, expecting to see carnage. Instead, the mouse had escaped with the peanut butter, which is no small feat considering its adhesive properties, but left the trap intact. Martin, who is a pacifist to the core, seemed secretly pleased.
As the mice outsmarted us night after night, his pride in them grew.
You're really happy they're getting away, I told him.
No---he said with an odd light in his eyes--But it is really a smart mouse.
I asked him if he had prayed that the mouse would escape. And he said, kind of.
I reminded him of disease, and that we have a child who eats everything, including indistinguishable things, in greedy fistfuls from the ground. I went back for more traps. There was a prominent display of traps at the front of the store, including a huge rat trap that made me shudder. As I paid, I told the men at the hardware store: I used to feel sorry for the mice, but I don't any more.
They laughed.
--Yes, I said, I can hardly wait to see their little necks broken.
They stopped laughing. This cessation of merriment, I know, was prompted by the realization that I was not so much funny as frightening. I had crossed the line from being femininely charming to being a feminist. Or a mad woman. Both of these things--feminist and mad women--I am into. But I do not think the hardware chappies were.
In any case, I talk a bigger game than I play. One glimpse of that gory mouse and understood two things:
1. the source of the odd smell I had detected off and on all morning
2. the fact that I would, in the near future, call Martin and tell him that I would rather
a. clean up human vomit
b. move away
c. scream my guts out
than deal with the dead mouse.
"Of course you would rather clean up vomit," he said, when I told him. "So would I. So would anyone."
Don't get me wrong. I am a feminist, and I am a tough woman. I have endured Elspeth falling down a flight of stairs with an open pair of scissors; roto viruses; boils as a child. But dead animals somehow just put me over the living edge.
We all have our weaknesses, and like Merry, I don't care if I'm not good. I will shovel the snow tonight, and Martin can jolly well take care of the mouse.
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Resist the Plant Lust! Reason vs. Nursery & Seed Co. Giddiness
There are stirrings of life on my mental Wazoo Farm as I ease the mouse cursor over Gurney's Nursery's happy images of tender male asparagus, doting lily of the valley, potpourric lavender, phallic Red Hot Pokers and stripey, muscular rhubarb stalks. Botany-intoxication floods warmly through me as I add:
Storm Petunia ("Legendary Performance!")
Hopa crabapple ("Like a Rosy Bouquet")
Hybrid tea roses ("elegant summer blooms")
Russian Sage ("Decidedly Fragrant Foliage")
And who can resist the "Blooming-est Daylily Ever?"
Who indeed?
It would be madness, I tell myself, not to click all these bright and varied plants! They can be mine! Click the mouse, by George, buy the lot! I can just see smell the hybrid teas, can feel the earlobes of the snapdragons, can feel within the core of my very being the wild excitement of Summer Pastel Yarrow's "Explosion of Color!"
O, Gurney's Seed & Nursery Co. has got me pegged. I drool all over the keyboard in undisguised plant lust as I tap in the plant codes.
"Forget the credit card balance!" I mutter under my breath. "Forget the drafts and the heating bill! Forget the mice problem! Forget the mortgage payment!" I want lilies, bleeding heart, balloon flower, and Mr. Lincoln the lovely hybrid tea!
I WANT SPRING! And I want to feel earthworms wiggling around my fingers and soil caking on my feet and blisters on my hands. I want these things and I want truckloads of profusely blooming perennials for my beds.
Ah, reason. The virtue that saves lovers from suicide, mothers from tearing their hair, marriages from ruin, cars out of canyons, credit cards from soaring balances. I reduce quantities, blink back tears, erase items completely. I have whittled my list down to a reasonable amount, alas for Gurney's Nursery, good for our bank account. Wazoo Farm will still be Wazoo Farm with a few less roses.
Of course, I still have three catalogs to go. Seeds of Change is selling trees, now, and I want every packet of their zinnia seeds. Henry Fields has a sale. I still have to do my part for trees by joining the Arbor Society, and filling their coffers with my nonexistent money. And did I mention the heirloom tea rose catalog on its way to my door?
Seems my hands will not lack from blisters this spring after all. Whoopee!
Storm Petunia ("Legendary Performance!")
Hopa crabapple ("Like a Rosy Bouquet")
Hybrid tea roses ("elegant summer blooms")
Russian Sage ("Decidedly Fragrant Foliage")
And who can resist the "Blooming-est Daylily Ever?"
Who indeed?
It would be madness, I tell myself, not to click all these bright and varied plants! They can be mine! Click the mouse, by George, buy the lot! I can just see smell the hybrid teas, can feel the earlobes of the snapdragons, can feel within the core of my very being the wild excitement of Summer Pastel Yarrow's "Explosion of Color!"
O, Gurney's Seed & Nursery Co. has got me pegged. I drool all over the keyboard in undisguised plant lust as I tap in the plant codes.
"Forget the credit card balance!" I mutter under my breath. "Forget the drafts and the heating bill! Forget the mice problem! Forget the mortgage payment!" I want lilies, bleeding heart, balloon flower, and Mr. Lincoln the lovely hybrid tea!
I WANT SPRING! And I want to feel earthworms wiggling around my fingers and soil caking on my feet and blisters on my hands. I want these things and I want truckloads of profusely blooming perennials for my beds.
Ah, reason. The virtue that saves lovers from suicide, mothers from tearing their hair, marriages from ruin, cars out of canyons, credit cards from soaring balances. I reduce quantities, blink back tears, erase items completely. I have whittled my list down to a reasonable amount, alas for Gurney's Nursery, good for our bank account. Wazoo Farm will still be Wazoo Farm with a few less roses.
Of course, I still have three catalogs to go. Seeds of Change is selling trees, now, and I want every packet of their zinnia seeds. Henry Fields has a sale. I still have to do my part for trees by joining the Arbor Society, and filling their coffers with my nonexistent money. And did I mention the heirloom tea rose catalog on its way to my door?
Seems my hands will not lack from blisters this spring after all. Whoopee!
The North Wind Doth Blow (Elephants in the Wind)
And we shall have snow--
And what will poor Robin do then, poor thing?
If you know the poem then you know the answer: poor Robin does what we all do--puts his head under his wing, poor thing.
Of course in Missoula, MT, where we gloriously dwelled for three years, everybody is out skiing and embracing the weather. Here in PA I am hunkered down watching the snow blow over Wazoo Farm.
What's the trick? One winter my sister said she was ready to meld with and form a happy relationship with the winter--all you have to do, she said, is relax every muscle you can--you'll lose the chill and you'll enjoy the cold at the same time. I have tried this, sitting in a car, waiting for the heater to fire up. I've battled against the urge to curl into a little tense ball, dense as a chestnut waiting under the snow. Once or twice I've even been able to accomplish the trick, and yes, it was effective. A sort of yoga for snowbound, cold people: it relaxed me, it centered me, it made me content. For a second, anyway.
Relaxing when you're cold is like trying to relax in the dentist's chair. Of course the way to relax in the dentist's chair is to imagine you're on an island sipping a ridiculous drink, or in a garden, or on your grandmother's knee. You don't relax by reconciling yourself and being happy about three or four hands shoved into your mouth and the whirs and scrapings. (I heard the history of dentistry--in sounds--on NPR today and I feel like there's nothing to complain about now).
Well, enough griping. Suffice it to say I'm indoors, enjoying the blowing snow and the sight of other people's tires spinning multiple times before they get traction.
Here's a song by Merry for the day (not often do you get phonics, religious devotion, multiple organs, and Valentine's Day in one perfect tune):
I wanna shine for Jesus
I gotta Valentine for Jesus
Open my hearts to Jesus
Sounds like a G but it's Jay-J-J-J!
I wanna J-J-J Jesus!
I wanna shine, Jesus!
I WANT JESUS!
Jesus sounds like a G
But he's just a Ja-Ja-Ja-Ja-Jesus!
Merry would be a fascinating field project for an anthropologist. She's a fine conglomeration of Episcopal (our and my parent's choice), Baptist (her TX grandparent's choice), Presbyterian (go figure) and Corneese.
Cornia is Merry's world, wherein the following characters dwell:
Elephant: indeterminate gender; always naughty and just on the brink of self-destruction
Cocoa: Elephant's father, and Merry's husband, who is a famous doctor, farmer, and what-not to boot. As far as I can tell, Cocoa is fairly level-headed but a bit of a fool when it comes to parenting.
Mano: Extra. I think he's Cocoa's brother.
Bodo, Godo, She ? Shitake?, etc: a crew of extras.
People in Cornia are rather wicked, I think. And of course therein lies the draw for Merry, who is by all accounts a very well-behaved child.
--You know WHAT? Merry says, eyes about to roll out of sockets.
--No.
--Elephant has been UP on the ROOF again.
--No!
--Yes! I said, Elephant, WHAT are you doing up on the ROOF? And he just jumped into the trees.
Well, you get the idea. Elephant is incorrigible, as my mother says--a sociopath at best, an absolute danger to society in truth.
Also, in Cornia, there is no God, or if there is, as Merry says, HE DOESN'T REALLY CARE WHAT YOU DO. I can't quite figure if there's government in Cornia, though I think perhaps there are jails, because I think Elephant has spent a few time-outs behind bars for some of his worse transgressions.
Besides keeping up with the goings-on of Elephant and his Cornia compadres, Merry freelances as a preacher, songwriter, dancer, and story-teller.
One day in IKEA, when she was three (this is after attending my in-law's Baptist church), Merry climbed onto a display and thrust her little fist in the air.
Jesus was born in MONTANA! she yelled.
He died for your sins on a cross in IOWA!
The passion and appropriate intonation with which she delivered her sermon brought a few people to tears and I can tell you with a triumphant heart that there were converts that day.
Oh, Merry Bear. What a funny mix you are: a soup, in fact, of all the odd and wonderful things that makes us all the botched-up, funny, graceful people. There is a wonderful liturgy about prophets and puzzled people; I googled until my googler was soggy and couldn't find it. But it's a wonderful mix, don't you think? We are usually puzzled, and rightly so, but once and a while there's a flash of inspiration, or God, and we are suddenly prophets. And in a way, a parent takes on a prophetic role every day, as does a friend to another friend: "You will be all right;" for instance; or "You are a creative, lovely person;" or even "You're a bad child." Naming people and situations is the same as prophesying.
So anything for Valentine's Day? Not really. It's cold and snowy; I stayed up late cutting out paper hearts for the members of Merry's preschool and then school was cancelled today. My father used to bring my sister and I roses and that was so nice, especially when the other girls seemed to be getting an embarrassment of flowers from boys (or, who knows? from themselves, perhaps). It seems just unfortunate that the advertising industry could have caused such a ridiculous hoo-ha all over the United States: disappointed lovers, lonely people, and money-spenders who pleased someone after all.
Well, Happy V Day. And more importantly, happy every day. Watch for elephants in the wind.
And what will poor Robin do then, poor thing?
If you know the poem then you know the answer: poor Robin does what we all do--puts his head under his wing, poor thing.
Of course in Missoula, MT, where we gloriously dwelled for three years, everybody is out skiing and embracing the weather. Here in PA I am hunkered down watching the snow blow over Wazoo Farm.
What's the trick? One winter my sister said she was ready to meld with and form a happy relationship with the winter--all you have to do, she said, is relax every muscle you can--you'll lose the chill and you'll enjoy the cold at the same time. I have tried this, sitting in a car, waiting for the heater to fire up. I've battled against the urge to curl into a little tense ball, dense as a chestnut waiting under the snow. Once or twice I've even been able to accomplish the trick, and yes, it was effective. A sort of yoga for snowbound, cold people: it relaxed me, it centered me, it made me content. For a second, anyway.
Relaxing when you're cold is like trying to relax in the dentist's chair. Of course the way to relax in the dentist's chair is to imagine you're on an island sipping a ridiculous drink, or in a garden, or on your grandmother's knee. You don't relax by reconciling yourself and being happy about three or four hands shoved into your mouth and the whirs and scrapings. (I heard the history of dentistry--in sounds--on NPR today and I feel like there's nothing to complain about now).
Well, enough griping. Suffice it to say I'm indoors, enjoying the blowing snow and the sight of other people's tires spinning multiple times before they get traction.
Here's a song by Merry for the day (not often do you get phonics, religious devotion, multiple organs, and Valentine's Day in one perfect tune):
I wanna shine for Jesus
I gotta Valentine for Jesus
Open my hearts to Jesus
Sounds like a G but it's Jay-J-J-J!
I wanna J-J-J Jesus!
I wanna shine, Jesus!
I WANT JESUS!
Jesus sounds like a G
But he's just a Ja-Ja-Ja-Ja-Jesus!
Merry would be a fascinating field project for an anthropologist. She's a fine conglomeration of Episcopal (our and my parent's choice), Baptist (her TX grandparent's choice), Presbyterian (go figure) and Corneese.
Cornia is Merry's world, wherein the following characters dwell:
Elephant: indeterminate gender; always naughty and just on the brink of self-destruction
Cocoa: Elephant's father, and Merry's husband, who is a famous doctor, farmer, and what-not to boot. As far as I can tell, Cocoa is fairly level-headed but a bit of a fool when it comes to parenting.
Mano: Extra. I think he's Cocoa's brother.
Bodo, Godo, She ? Shitake?, etc: a crew of extras.
People in Cornia are rather wicked, I think. And of course therein lies the draw for Merry, who is by all accounts a very well-behaved child.
--You know WHAT? Merry says, eyes about to roll out of sockets.
--No.
--Elephant has been UP on the ROOF again.
--No!
--Yes! I said, Elephant, WHAT are you doing up on the ROOF? And he just jumped into the trees.
Well, you get the idea. Elephant is incorrigible, as my mother says--a sociopath at best, an absolute danger to society in truth.
Also, in Cornia, there is no God, or if there is, as Merry says, HE DOESN'T REALLY CARE WHAT YOU DO. I can't quite figure if there's government in Cornia, though I think perhaps there are jails, because I think Elephant has spent a few time-outs behind bars for some of his worse transgressions.
Besides keeping up with the goings-on of Elephant and his Cornia compadres, Merry freelances as a preacher, songwriter, dancer, and story-teller.
One day in IKEA, when she was three (this is after attending my in-law's Baptist church), Merry climbed onto a display and thrust her little fist in the air.
Jesus was born in MONTANA! she yelled.
He died for your sins on a cross in IOWA!
The passion and appropriate intonation with which she delivered her sermon brought a few people to tears and I can tell you with a triumphant heart that there were converts that day.
Oh, Merry Bear. What a funny mix you are: a soup, in fact, of all the odd and wonderful things that makes us all the botched-up, funny, graceful people. There is a wonderful liturgy about prophets and puzzled people; I googled until my googler was soggy and couldn't find it. But it's a wonderful mix, don't you think? We are usually puzzled, and rightly so, but once and a while there's a flash of inspiration, or God, and we are suddenly prophets. And in a way, a parent takes on a prophetic role every day, as does a friend to another friend: "You will be all right;" for instance; or "You are a creative, lovely person;" or even "You're a bad child." Naming people and situations is the same as prophesying.
So anything for Valentine's Day? Not really. It's cold and snowy; I stayed up late cutting out paper hearts for the members of Merry's preschool and then school was cancelled today. My father used to bring my sister and I roses and that was so nice, especially when the other girls seemed to be getting an embarrassment of flowers from boys (or, who knows? from themselves, perhaps). It seems just unfortunate that the advertising industry could have caused such a ridiculous hoo-ha all over the United States: disappointed lovers, lonely people, and money-spenders who pleased someone after all.
Well, Happy V Day. And more importantly, happy every day. Watch for elephants in the wind.
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
From a farm that doesn't yet exist
At the moment, Wazoo Farm is blanketed with a soggy layer of snow. If you look out our dining room window, you will see a steep hill rutted with sledrunners; a collapsed cardboard box that holds a frozen pile of kitchen scraps; an aboveground pool with three feet of frozen water sitting within a blue torn liner; and a blown-over length of fence. Through the limbs of the lovely bare locust tree at the bottom of our hill you will glimpse--no, I must be honest--take an eyefull of three moldy looking trailers.
You might think, looking out, that Wazoo Farm is a bust. Wazoo Farm will never be. Ah, friend, but that is because you look through the eyes of the literal gazer.
When I look out of the window of our almost 100-year old Dutch Colonial Revival house, I see a gorgeous, mouthwatering paradise. The pool is gone; in its place is a delightful and very servicable potager garden. Its compact rows of herbs and cabbages and furling peas are accented by wild splashes of zinnias and spicy marigolds. Equipped with proper English harvesting basket, I trip down the stairs every evening to harvest young tender greens for salads. I stride down the stairs studded into our hill, enjoying the scent of sprawling roses at my left. At my right, raspberries and blackberries scramble down the hill through a sea of blooming hairy vetch. At the bottom of the hill, chaps and ladies (and brawny gardening women like me) can pause in their proper days (or sweaty labors) to take a cup of darjeeling in the tea garden. Looking over the rim of your tea cup, shading by the boughs of flowering dogwood and almond trees, you can swoon over the summer bulbs, the bright pink verbena, the heirloom tea roses.
Have I mentioned: my cutting garden, the children's garden, the proper and marching hedgerows, the rose garden, the orchard?
We have 3/4 of an acre on a relatively busy street. I say relatively because we live in a small town in western PA (Pennsyltuckey, as our dear but eastcoast-snob friends sniff down their city noses). Okay, so it's a mining town with a small but robust college (where my husband teaches poetry). It's got a motely assortment of gorgeous old houses in varying condition, some modest depression-era houses, and some trailers to keep us all grounded. It's one of the poorest, if not the poorest, areas in Pennsylvania and in the United States. West Virginia, with its green bosom, snuggles close. It can feel grubby, poor, and sad.
But look around when spring creeps up. A short drive takes our breath away. The hills are jewel-like and greener than kale. They seem to pulse with a life that makes us think of God. The trees are dense and friendly.
This is a perfect spot for Wazoo Farm. Believe me. So we have no money, no resources, and little know-how. Surely visions, and supernatural longing for the beautiful and productive, will overcome these small hurdles.
Did I mention the spired cities of blue delphiniums?
The winter will end, and so will the spring. By the end of the summer, we will have zinnias, and apple trees, and roses, and all rambling poppy-daisy-hollyhock finery out the wazoo. Just wait. You'll want to come and visit.
You might think, looking out, that Wazoo Farm is a bust. Wazoo Farm will never be. Ah, friend, but that is because you look through the eyes of the literal gazer.
When I look out of the window of our almost 100-year old Dutch Colonial Revival house, I see a gorgeous, mouthwatering paradise. The pool is gone; in its place is a delightful and very servicable potager garden. Its compact rows of herbs and cabbages and furling peas are accented by wild splashes of zinnias and spicy marigolds. Equipped with proper English harvesting basket, I trip down the stairs every evening to harvest young tender greens for salads. I stride down the stairs studded into our hill, enjoying the scent of sprawling roses at my left. At my right, raspberries and blackberries scramble down the hill through a sea of blooming hairy vetch. At the bottom of the hill, chaps and ladies (and brawny gardening women like me) can pause in their proper days (or sweaty labors) to take a cup of darjeeling in the tea garden. Looking over the rim of your tea cup, shading by the boughs of flowering dogwood and almond trees, you can swoon over the summer bulbs, the bright pink verbena, the heirloom tea roses.
Have I mentioned: my cutting garden, the children's garden, the proper and marching hedgerows, the rose garden, the orchard?
We have 3/4 of an acre on a relatively busy street. I say relatively because we live in a small town in western PA (Pennsyltuckey, as our dear but eastcoast-snob friends sniff down their city noses). Okay, so it's a mining town with a small but robust college (where my husband teaches poetry). It's got a motely assortment of gorgeous old houses in varying condition, some modest depression-era houses, and some trailers to keep us all grounded. It's one of the poorest, if not the poorest, areas in Pennsylvania and in the United States. West Virginia, with its green bosom, snuggles close. It can feel grubby, poor, and sad.
But look around when spring creeps up. A short drive takes our breath away. The hills are jewel-like and greener than kale. They seem to pulse with a life that makes us think of God. The trees are dense and friendly.
This is a perfect spot for Wazoo Farm. Believe me. So we have no money, no resources, and little know-how. Surely visions, and supernatural longing for the beautiful and productive, will overcome these small hurdles.
Did I mention the spired cities of blue delphiniums?
The winter will end, and so will the spring. By the end of the summer, we will have zinnias, and apple trees, and roses, and all rambling poppy-daisy-hollyhock finery out the wazoo. Just wait. You'll want to come and visit.
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