Some thoughts on an election.

Shel Silverstein is a brilliant author and artist whose words and pictures will be a staple in my children's lives. In his book, The Missing Piece, he writes of a creature in search of something missing within himself. Once he finds this piece, he discovers that his happiness was in the search, not in having what he wanted. The valuable lesson here is that if we are too satisfied or complete, there is not much need for interaction with the outside world. If we have all the answers, if there is nothing to learn, what's the point in living?

An election year is always going to cause nervousness among citizens because we all know how those we elect can make decisions that can likely trickle down to affect our daily lives. Some of us have experienced it in negative ways, some of us haven't been affected enough to be too concerned. This is the first election year where I'm not as concerned as I used to be, and my reason is because I know that the world's problems will not be resolved when our only choices are two very flawed parties with candidates more concerned with representing their party than the people. I have read a lot lately regarding many current heated political issues, and the comments on these articles are as educational as the articles themselves.

But the main discouragement for me came when I realized that the passionate ones are unfortunately the oblivious ones. I don't just mean oblivious of the facts, which is very common. I mean oblivious of the person. If someone has disagreed with me on what I believe about something, what I would like is for that person to ask me why. Ask me what my story is. Ask for the reason behind why I believe what you think is wrong. If you make it your goal to love me more than you love your ideals, you will be surprised to find your ideals make more sense. If you make the person your concern and put the issue aside, you will find understanding.  You will understand the person, and when you discover their reasons and their values, you will understand yourself. And through that, you will understand the issue much better. There is no way to lose when you put people above politics. Because if you don't care about the people, than what are you fighting for?

Another discouragement is the pride among many in these discussions. I don't care how much you've read or how many people you've talked to, there is still something you don't know. Part of what it means to be human is to be limited. Limited in our understanding, our views, our sight, our knowledge. There is always something you will not get, because there is always someone whose mind doesn't work the way yours does. There is always someone who has experiences you will never have. There is always someone who will never be able to express their passions in a language you both understand. When you recognize that, you have no choice but to make concessions for others in their beliefs. You cannot argue what you do not know. But if you care more about the person than about being right, your relationships will be better, and what is your life if you have none of those? 

Please remember above all else that while our political figures affect our lives, they are not the ones who will be bringing you meals when your loved ones have gone or when you've lost your job. I believe that what goes on in the government is worth our attention and our voices, but when what they do affects you, they are not the ones who will be there for you when you have to deal with it. It is your neighbors, your family, your coworkers, your friends.  

I know there is much to learn and much in my current beliefs to cause concern among some, but I don't have everything figured out, and I don't ever intend to. But I will keep learning and I will keep asking questions and I will keep searching, and if I'm right, then that's just wonderful. If I'm wrong, I'll keep learning. 

I had a dream

"I was a little girl
alone in my little world
who dreamed of a little home for me

I played pretend between the trees
and fed my houseguests bark and leaves
and laughed in my pretty bed of green

I had a dream
that I could fly from the highest swing
I had a dream"

I discovered this song in mid-June of last year, loving it so much and listening to it on repeat. It was in my head all through my time in Zambrano, and I hummed it to myself constantly.

The song reminds me of when I was a small lass of ten, and I used to roam the green pastures of my childhood and daydream... I remember when my life was simpler, though it didn't seem that way then. And I'm all too certain that in another ten years I'll look back on my life now and perceive it to be simpler now. I will only gain more in the way of knowledge and understanding as I grow older, and that makes the mess of my mind feel so much . . . messier. But of all the new things that I learn, one thing that I'm realizing more and more since I've left my teens is that the things that were at the forefront of my everyday ideas of what mattered really don't matter at all. Like the amassing of things. The need for a lot of money. The plans every child unknowingly makes that involve good grades so they can get into a good college so they can get a good education so they can get a good job so they can make good money so they can have a good family so they can raise good kids to get good grades to go to a good college and so on.

The American Dream is something I'm looking at and wondering if it aligns at all with the dream Jesus had. It is defined as the opportunity for prosperity and success according to ability and achievement, and I'm not so sure that's exactly what Jesus had in mind. It's not a sin to own your own home, but Jesus was homeless. It's not a sin to work hard to provide income, but Jesus lived entirely off of the generosity of others (specifically rich wives, but that's beside the point). When I look at the system that has been set in place as industry and time swiftly proceed, I begin to wonder if the faces that are left behind were worth the price. And I shutter when I think that I have been a part of leaving those faces behind.

I look at the food in my pantry, and I wonder whose hands were responsible for growing what made that food. And do those hands get to rest as often as mine do? I look at the clothes in my closet, and I wonder whose child's hands were responsible for putting them together. And did I really need half of those clothes? Many of us would look at our full closets and pantries, and we think we are blessed, but when I realize that these blessings were borne on the backs of cheap labor and exploited humans, I begin to wonder if they are really blessings at all. God has blessed America, we say, but by torturing the workers of other countries? I have realized that my failure as a Christian was not so much that I bought a cup of coffee, not sure who was rightfully paid for it or that I have helped to keep Old Navy in business. My failure was that I succumbed to the belief that this is the only way of living. This is what is offered to me, so I have to take it.

And I then realize that an even deeper failure exists beneath all that. It is the failure to believe that as a being of God's image, I have the ability to create, meaning that my imagination is to reflect God's imagination. I have failed to believe that God's imagination for how we are to live is way bigger than, and not limited to the ways of living that are so infused into our society. I have been given new eyes to see that the way of Jesus is possible without leaving others behind, with our scraps and leftovers - if we've left any. Jesus had a dream where the kingdom that he was/is building would be a kingdom open to everyone, and that has to start with me. Everyone deserves a full life, and so much is required for that: food, education, medicine, friendship. There is no reason why everyone in the world cannot have that other than those who have too much will not give to those who have none. I read once that the only way to make poverty history is to make affluence history. I don't need ten coats and thirty sweaters. Especially when the majority of my neighbors have none.

I would like very much to wake up every day and commit to a different path. A path that excludes taking part in a lifestyle that has abused someone else along the way. And I know that I will fail many times. I will still buy Hershey's chocolate at some point, I will still pay four dollars for a cup of coffee, and I may buy a garment at Wal-Mart. But what I have decided for today is that I'm tired of stuff. And I really don't ever need what I think I need. What I need is to extend my hand as it holds what I've been given, and offer what I know to the sweatshop workers in Honduras who made my hoodie, or to the immigrant farmers in Florida who put the orange juice in my fridge, or to the many, many children who can't get to school because they can't afford the uniforms or the supplies. The world that Jesus dreamed of does not have to be the world I live in, and I certainly won't succeed in making it that world when I'm still stuck believing that the old way is the only way. While I miss being ten years old, and my biggest concerns were how much I hated it when people still called me "little," I am glad that my dreams have expanded as my knowledge has expanded, and I can't say for sure that I'd like to go back.

My dream now is that I will be able to look at everyone and see the image of my God reflected in them, and I will be able to clasp my hand with theirs, not as an American, but as a Christian, a sister whose familial love exceeds national, economic, societal, and racial borders.

Well said.

A statement of belief... about things.

An interesting discussion took place in the after-class chatty moments of walking out the door with my beloved professor (easily among the list of top ten women who inspire me) and another classmate. It began over a discussion of some uneducated comments someone made on someone else's Facebook status. It led me to thinking about how many times an opinion has been made known and responded to with absolute harshness and opposition before ever being fully understood or clarified.

Now, while I don't always support the sharing of feelings through a Facebook status update, I do realize that we are all different, and sometimes events and emotions swell up to the point that the venue in which a person expresses such welling up can't always be thought through. A time and a place, and all. I understand. One of the things my professor said after class was that it shocked her how easily people can get angry over someone who disagrees with him or her. And it is shocking, not just in the area of social networks, but in life in general. People cannot realize or accept the fact that the world is not full of humans who agree with each other and with themselves on every area and every angle in every perspective of every issue relating to every kind of human being in every culture of every standing and background. And thank God for that.

Another thing she said was that people who don't understand such opinions and statements of belief and respond in such passionate ignorance are uneducated because the only other people they talk to are ones who think and believe exactly the same way they do. And so they are merely reflecting and regurgitating each other. Iron cannot sharpen iron if they are not opposing each other. You will not grow if you are never opposed.

My requests for humankind (for today):
1: Please do not personally debate disagreements over religious and political issues through a social network of any kind (or texting, while we're at it). It is impersonal, cold, and somewhat cowardly.

2:Please know what you're talking about.

3:Please, please know what you're talking about.

4:If you insist on writing out your feelings, please spell your words completely. In other words, the second person pronoun needs all three of its letters. We are intelligent human beings, and the laziness of not adding two more characters to a word is unacceptable.

5:Please understand that the world is also not full of humans who are out to attempt with every action and word to destroy your belief system and tear down your values. Some, like myself, are curious, passionate ponderers who simply want to know more. We will never know more unless we understand those who are not of our school of thought. When we ask questions, when we challenge your statements, it is for the purpose of challenging ourselves in order to expand our understanding beyond what it is.

So stand up to your statements when challenged because I want to be smarter.

And thus the whirligig of time brings in his revenges.

~Twelfth Night Act 5, scene 1

Oh my teachers are so inspiring. I want to be like all of them. Today in poetry workshop, we talked about authenticity. We read essays by poets who pondered this idea and how it is expressed through writings. The artist faces many dilemmas, but one in particular that I want to discuss is the dilemma of authenticity. To be authentic is a tough thing because you have to decide how you're going to do it. We think authenticity is genuineness and using your own voice, and that's true. But as a writer, you have to be authentic to your audience. You have to take into account what your readers want, since you are, after all, writing for them. But the way that this authenticity fails is when the writer forgets that while his product has to appeal to someone, it still has to maintain its appeal to him.

My poetry has gone through workshops and conferences and critiques and forums, and everyone from friends, students, teachers and strangers have all had their say in what should be done with it and how it can be best revised, and that is needed. It is a well-known fact that nothing beautiful can be generated without the input of fresh eyes and ears who have no bias to your work. But as artists, it is a common downfall to get so caught up in what other people want, that we forget the most important thing which is that our work has to have value to us. My poems need to mean something to me, and if I sell out to the point that I'm only including or adding what others think should be there when I know deep down, because I know my poems better than anyone, that I am destroying the soul of the poem, I have gone too far.

Dear ones, I must inform you of something. I feel like God is trying to tell me something. For so long, I have lived under the guidance and supervision of others. And this is a good thing which I have no intention of disrupting. But it has to change. I have realized that I have taken a certain ideal too far. "With many advisers, plans succeed," the proverb says. True, very true. But I am forgetting that it is I who makes the decisions on my life. Those I trust more than anything have golden advice which I appreciate sincerely and take seriously, but I have to recognize that these people are not the sole authority on what is best for me. I'm sure most of you already knew that, and no one (most of the time) has ever given me advice I did not first ask for, so this is a realization more for myself than for (most of) the rest of you. But after asking twenty people what they think I should do, and hearing twenty different responses, I have to accept the fact that it comes down to me. And only me. I decide. I act. I cannot let myself be run by others anymore.

But I always think that the best way to know God is to love many things.

Precious lovelies, I have things to say. I heard someone say the other day that all of our dreams will be fulfilled somehow, eventually, at some point throughout our lifetimes, though likely not in the way, shape, form, or time we had originally imagined. But fulfilled, nonetheless. This came as a relief to me, as I have plenty of dreams. Too many to the point that I wonder if any of them will happen in the particular time frames that I desire. But the good news is that I have, more so than ever before, begun to gain a firm handle on who I am. More and more now, I am comfortable with myself, confident of my own dreams, and certain of what I want and who I want it all with. I am reaching a point now, where even though the next few steps are foggy, I am sure of which one I stand on now.

My recent thoughts and ponderings have been centered on graduation and what next and such, among other things. I have plans. Aspirations I'm in the process of reaching. The big ones, Europe, teaching, moving around, travel. Then comes the "what after that?" And truth be told, I'm not sure. It's a case of "what shouldn't I do after that?" I want to do everything. A few days ago, some of my friends brought up the idea of Boston. Boston? I don't know where that came from, but immediately, the thought of it washed over me so pleasantly, I had no reason to turn my nose up at it. Graduate school is also an option. Alabama has a creative writing program that is phenomenal. If I get accepted, full tuition, two additional stipends, and health insurance. Um, yes please. Then seminary. Honestly, if I had known how much I would love the classes in my minor, I would have gone to a school that allowed me to major in it. But I love the W, and I love English just as much. But more than that, at the moment, I want to travel and teach English as a second language. I want to go everywhere. And ultimately, I want to settle down somewhere in a Nashville-ish area (preferably Nashville) in an old house with a big porch for coffee in the mornings, reading during the rain, and jam sessions at night.

And here's the crazy part, y'all. I'm finally beginning to accept that if I want to do something, I can do it. Over the past several months, it's been like a dimmer switch where I finally realized that I don't have to sit here and let things happen TO me and jostle me and my self around. So much great advice has been compiled by my professors over the years, but this one gem will stick to the forefront of my mind: "If you want to do something, then do it! Quit complaining about how you're too old and too much time has gone by." So. It's up to me to make this happen. I will be hurt, I know. But I will find so much more that will make it all worth it. And if I believe I will find that, I will find it.

I just need to get over this hurdle. Whatever mysterious road block that causes me to clench my teeth to the point that my dentist is freaked out, lose hair to the point that my stylist brings it up, and lose weight to the point that I don't really care so much. Why am I this stressed? I don't know. And not knowing is stressing me. I really do feel fine. Relaxed, even. And when I wake up, I don't feel deprived of sleep at all. But I still have that slight pang greeting me in my jaw and gums that say they've been busy while I dreamed.

For some reason, a certain memory has popped up in my mind in recent days. I have had my heart set on Nashville since I was a little girl. Not sure why exactly. It was just one of those things that's always been in the back of my mind. When I graduated high school, my dear aunt took me to this music city for a few days, and I loved it all. But the evening I adored more than anything, was the night we went to the Bluebird Cafe. Seventeen songwriters, y'all. Seventeen. Each one doing two or three songs. My aunt and I had gotten there late, so there were no tables left, and as I was seventeen at the time, we couldn't sit at the bar. So I took my spot on a cabinet behind the hostess stand, and my aunt had the stool in front of it. That was where we ate our food and watched the show for those lovely long hours. I really don't understand why that has been on my thoughts lately, but I do miss it. I miss live music. I want to go find it again. We were happy together once, and maybe we can be happy together again.

Pitter-pat, the angel on my shoulder is haunting me tonight.

The story of today.

I sat at this desk two hours ago to write a two-page response paper on one of my favorite poems (I know that doesn't narrow it down) and I have succeeded at just now reaching my third paragraph. I have also accomplished an empty glass of Pepsi as well as the disappearance of two cookies and a mug of cappuccino along with a change in wardrobe and the addition of socks on my feet. I wish I could impress you more by saying I did it all without leaving my chair.

It has been fifteen minutes and I have finished the paper.

If only I could have also finished the cleaning of my room, a trip to the gym, a shower, the cleaning of my bathroom, the washing/vacuuming of my car, the filling of gas in my car, my Gryffindor scarf, my book for Nonfiction Writing, all my reading assignments, my six-page seminar paper, my personality profile of JK Rowling, and the basic decluttering of all aspects of my life.

In my dream I am waiting to board a train from Greece to Prague with a blue suitcase that doesn't have any stickers on it because that's tacky. I meet someone who interests me and we begin a conversation with coffee. We are so enthralled with each other that we miss our train. We therefore decide to travel with no map and make up our own, and I have found my best friend.

In my dream I have an accent and I always wear a scarf from Pakistan. In my dream I am someone who has learned to appreciate the fact that life should be sticky and adventurous instead of plastic and ordinary. In my dream I can love people as they need and not as they deserve. Because in my dream I am my definition of perfect.

This is the mess of where dreams cross with reality. And truly, I don't believe that is ever supposed to happen. Because dreams are not meant to be reality. Even when they do, supposedly become so, it is never as we dreamed. It is either better or worse, but never the same. And if we could spend our time loving what is given, perhaps we could let our dreams be just what they are and nothing more.

I do believe in dreaming. I believe in dreaming big. But I also believe in living small. And I believe that dreams are gifts. But I also believe that small things are gifts. A dream may come true, but we must be sure to know the difference between what is now dream and what is now reality and quit comparing. Make sense? I hope so because I surely don't understand it.

Also, feast your eyes on this --

This is what happens when one searches "feet" on Google images.

i've still never had creme brulee.

But every time I watch Amelie, I sure wish I had some. The Honey Trees are singing to me right now. I have successfully completed one page of each of the 4-page papers I have due next week. One for Wednesday and one for Thursday. I have successfully completed the three page rough draft I have due for Monday, and I've yet to study for either of my tests on Monday. Although I did make my study guides for those tests. I just have yet to look at them . . . .

No worries though. I am exactly where I planned to be. And that rarely happens.

Right now I'd just like to curl up in my grandma's afghan and knit my scarf while drinking my tea and watching . . . well I don't know exactly . . . I guess Amelie or having someone read to me. Perhaps something from H.D. or the book I'm trying to get through right now that doesn't pertain to college, The Elegance of the Hedgehog. Marvelous book. It makes me feel smart, and I'd really love to just finish it though I still have about a third of it left.

I miss those January days where I'd curl up in my dorm room and read Harry Potter and feel no guilt whatsoever about not doing homework because none of my books had arrived yet. So long ago . . . last year.

Also, I decided tonight . . . or like two minutes ago . . . that I want to be that person that no one really knows but recognizes. That person with a title because I have one distinguishing feature. I don't know. Like "that girl with the red tights" or "that chick with the moon boots" or "that lady who always wears plaid." I just think that would be cool for a little while. Or something. So one day in the future I will move to a new city far away and buy myself some red tights and wear them every day for a month. Okay, I'll buy several pairs and wash them.